Today I shall speak briefly on the title “The Dividing Point of Good and Evil.”
What God Agonizes Over
The world in which we live, as you commonly know, has not become a good world. In such a world, to aim at goodness and set up a purpose of goodness is an exceedingly difficult thing.
If the very way of living of the people of the world is not good, the society in which those people live is likewise not good; and if that society is not good, that nation too is likewise not good. We can know that if there are many nations that are not good, the world too cannot but become a world that is not good.
When we consider the course of history that has come about in this way, and consider the present age now, and consider a time that may remain in the future, you must know that to set up a center of goodness before this whole field today and to accomplish one purpose of goodness oneself is exceedingly difficult.
When we reckon up the course of history until now, countless saints and sages came and went. They were greater and more eager and stronger than we ourselves who live today in every respect, and were great men who broke through all the adversities of their age. And they were excellent people of character incomparable with us, and the road upon which they writhed while seeking to pursue goodness was not a level road. We know the fact that they pursued one act of goodness, one place of goodness, exchanging themselves for death, or undergoing suffering and sacrificing their life courses.
Yet as for goodness, seen worldwide there will be worldwide goodness, and seen nationally there will be national goodness. Or, seen in terms of a people, there will be a people’s goodness; seen in terms of a family, family goodness; and seen in terms of an individual, individual goodness. The goodness centering upon the individual and the goodness centering upon the family and the goodness centering upon the tribe and the goodness centering upon the people and the goodness centering upon the nation and the goodness centering upon the world must be made one and advance in one direction. Yet until now, they have come forth one-sidedly. That is, they have been developing in each different direction, toward an eastern position, a western position, a southern position, and a northern position.
Even considering people, if there are a hundred people, all hundred are entirely different. Just as each has different forebears, and faces and speech and all behavior are of a thousand shapes and ten thousand forms, so the direction of goodness that we human beings pursue cannot but be each different. God carries out His dispensation with such people and such forms and such companies before Him.
Therefore, we cannot but consider here the problem of how to make the direction of individual goodness one with a direction of goodness that can go for the sake of the whole purpose. If God exists, He must first carry out a movement of joining such differing directions of goodness into one direction.
Seen from this point, to gather them into one direction, something needed for this must come forth. Here God cannot but think of presenting one direction, centering upon a social foundation, by being equipped with a horizontal bond that is transnational and trans-state. What was for the sake of presenting such a direction was the countless number of religions that have appeared in the course of history.
An individual, if it be an individual, pursues goodness according to the direction of his conscience. It means that if the direction of that person’s conscience is east, it is east, and if west, it is west, and centering upon that, he pursues goodness.
An individual will have an individual’s spring, and a family a family’s spring, and a nation a nation’s spring, and the world the world’s spring. Then, to fit the direction of spring centering upon the worldwide fortune, the worldwide spring must coincide with the national spring, and the national spring must coincide with the spring of the people, the tribe, the family, and the individual. Without thus making the directions one, one cannot be equipped with universality and validity before the whole world and accomplish the purpose of goodness. Therefore, seen from God’s position, is it not a tremendous problem of how to present a unified direction from the individual through the family, tribe, people, nation, and world a tremendous problem?
Seen from this perspective, it is exceedingly natural that there must be one religion that can present one direction. Even though that religion set out centering upon some particular people, it must not be limited to those people but must become a religion that can cross beyond national borders and exert influence upon the whole world. It must present one direction so that the world may go forward toward one purpose.
God considers how to make the world go forward jointly toward one purpose, that is, how to present one direction and make things one with it. Therefore, we can draw the conclusion that the nearer the Last Days come, the more a worldwide unification of direction will without fail be accomplished centering upon such a religion.
The Relationship Between God and Man and the Role of Religion
We can know that God and we human beings are in a relationship that cannot be separated even if one would separate it. How do we know this? We know it by looking at the human mind.
If we look at our minds, everything that works within the mind itself is not something that I, subjectively and actively, command myself. My mind itself is, to the very end, relative. That it is a relative position means that there is some subject.
Some power that causes our minds to pursue goodness, and to pursue better value, and to pursue a better environment of goodness does not depart until we die but supports us throughout our lives; yet it is not that one’s own self is the motive of it. One’s own self is to the very end in a relative position. The conscience gathers the body from a position of being one with some subject.
To give an example, if it be a plus when we look centering upon a plus, there must not be a plus alone. A minus must come into being. At this time the plus and the minus are relative beings to one another. Likewise, your body and mind are also relative beings to one another.
Body and mind are thus relative beings to one another; how then is it that this body has not become one? The problem is simple. If the mind, which is the plus, becomes one with the body, which is the minus, that is, in the position of object, it is so arranged as to become one automatically. Yet human beings today do not know this.
Then what is it that God is thinking of as He comes forth?
He is thinking of how, centering upon one starting point that the world’s humanity commonly requires and centering upon a source of mind at which anyone, whatever it may be, can completely become one, He shall break through this contradictory condition of body and mind, which were originally in a relationship of subject and object but are presently placed in a contradictory relationship, and make conditions by which they can need one another and thereby bind them in a bond that cannot be parted even if one would part it.
Therefore, what does religion pursue? It pursues the mind. Then what is the mind? When we look centering upon the mind itself, if a complete minus comes into being, a plus automatically comes into being. You must know that. Likewise, if one complete plus comes into being, one complete minus automatically comes into being. This is the reason for heaven and earth.
Today, if our mind itself becomes a complete minus, there must be a complete plus. That is, if our mind itself becomes a complete minus, we can take hold of a complete plus. Practicing Zen meditation (참선) too is to pursue such a state. That is, it is in order, through Zen meditation, to reach a world of complete nothingness and to set out anew from a still (정적, 靜的) state like the horizon. That too is necessary. It is also necessary to enter into contact with the pure original foundation of mind, undefiled, a new dynamic origin, and to set out from one pulse. It is also necessary to make that one pulse the origin of a new departure.
God Is the Subject of the Working of Conscience
Even movement cannot be done alone. To move, there must without fail be a relative being. There is no law of moving without a relative being present. It means that there is no law of working. Seeing this, from where does the working of conscience come forth? It comes forth from power. Then from where does that power come forth? This is the problem.
What must there be before there is power?
Before there is power, there must be a subject and an object that can form a relationship. The world of science today says that the universe is made of power, of energy. Then is energy the foundation of the universe? No. What must there be before that energy exists? There must be a subject and an object. Seen logically, that is a natural conclusion. If the universe exists, there must be action, and before there is action, there must be power, and before there is power, there must be a subject and an object.
Then from where do subject and object come?
There must be a foundation from which these can come forth. In our Unification Church, we call these “dual characteristics.” This subject and object are not a subject and object made within man himself.
Power itself acts. Yet if it would act, there must be a circuit that can make that power act. Without such a road of giving and receiving, power does not act. Your heart too beats because there are circulatory organs such as arteries and veins.
Likewise, all action must without fail be equipped with a corresponding relationship of subject and object.
What must there be before power exists?
There must be a subject and an object. And in order for there to be a subject and an object, there must be a foundation for them.
Then which is first? Because this world cannot discern the relationship of before and after, confusion unfolds. Which is the subject and which is the object….
All existing things of the earthly world in which we live today are in a relationship of subject and object. Just as human beings are composed of men and women, animals and plants too are all composed of males and females.
Then which is the subject? Now this is being confused. Therefore, it must be turned about. When we set our hands down, the right hand and the left hand look the same when seen in this way. Yet the right hand and the left hand are fundamentally different in their direction. There may be some who do not know it well, but one is right and one is left. The Kingdom of Heaven and hell too are similar in shape but different in direction. It means that ordinary people do not know this well.
Therefore, a foundation is necessary here. That foundation is what we in the Unification Church today call “dual characteristics.” Within dual characteristics there must be original internal nature and original external form.
Because the working of conscience too is unmistakably an action, there must without fail be a subject and object here. When we analyze the content of that power, there is without fail a relationship of subject and object there. The chemical action that occurs when one does a chemical experiment all occurs in that way. As soon as a relative relationship is established, a reaction occurs at once. Such relative relationships and conflicting relationships are the foundation of the universe.
Then what is conflict? Plus and minus are in a conflicting relationship. Centering upon such mutual repulsion or conflicting action, the communists assert the dialectic.
Then is mutual repulsion a bad thing?
Mutual repulsion is something that cannot be dispensed with. If there were no mutual repulsion, circular movement could not take place. If everything only pulled toward one another, it would become only a straight line and not a circle.
Even looking at a magnetic field, plus and minus pull toward one another. If they only pulled in this way, it ought to become a straight line, so why does it become circular? It is because there is mutual repulsion. It is because plus and plus, and minus and minus, carry on a mutually repelling action. Because the nearer they are, the more they perform such actions; circular movement and spherical movement unfold. That is the reaction to direct action.
From this perspective, when it is asked whether you have a conscience or not, a person who says he has no conscience is a madman. Even a person of whom we think, “I do not know whether that person has a mind,” unmistakably has a conscience. Both man and woman all have a conscience. Whatever the shape of that conscience may be, all people have a conscience. What does the conscience look like? What should it look like? It is well made, of course. It is made like your face. It means that the conscience and the face are inside and outside. Inside and outside are the same.
Because that conscience acts as power, there is without fail a subject and an object there. Though one does not know what that subject is, if my conscience becomes a complete minus, a complete plus appears quickly. The world of the Way is such a world.
Did anyone offer devotion from the very first knowing that God exists?
When you offered devotion, did you offer devotion knowing whether God exists or not? Yet if one keeps digging into the world of the mind, the scope of it gradually widens. What was at first a straight line gradually comes to be connected horizontally, and a reaction comes; and just as a radio makes sound through an antenna, power comes to you as well. We say that fire comes upon our bodies, do we not? It means that the reasoning is the same. Power comes.
How does that power come? It is the same as how, according to how pure the radio itself is, the result comes out of whether it can cleanly convert the radio waves coming from a far distance. So where does the problem lie? It lies in our becoming a complete minus. Only when one becomes a complete minus can one find a complete plus.
Therefore, it means that God cannot cast man away. If there were no human beings, God too would be lonely. God has been coming forth, toiling until now, but because in the midst of that toil human beings writhe and repent, saying they have done wrong, even when He has been disheartened, He comes forth again with a new hope. He comes forth centering upon one great hope that in the days ahead a higher world of goodness centering upon man can be accomplished. In the process, it is pioneering; it is innovation; it is development; it is reform. He comes forth carrying these out. By doing so, He goes forward toward a worldwide spring day.
A Thought That Can Resolve the Conflict of Body and Mind
It is the same with you. A person whose conscience is clear knows, even while remaining still, whether it will be a good time or a bad time. There are people whom one likes for no reason even upon meeting them for the first time. What does it mean to like them for no reason? It means that one is drawn to that person. That person is either a complete plus, that is, a high plus, or a high minus. Even if I am of a plus nature, if he is of a higher minus nature, I am drawn along. And when I am a minus and he is a higher plus, I too am drawn along. Yet when I am a plus and that person is a stronger plus than I, when we come into contact, we repel each other.
In the world of our human mind too, an action like electrical action, an action of attraction, occurs. This appears in the form of conscience. It is only that you cannot distinguish it, but the movements of your daily life are the same. All are moving scientifically. According to the direction and the disposition, according to how much and what percentage they fuse, the good and bad of the whole are determined. Therefore, it means that the working of conscience cannot be independent.
Fundamentally, it is arranged in this way, and yet the body and mind of man are different and always fight. The body ought to be minus and the mind plus, but this has been turned upside down. To say it again, it means that they are contradictory. Yet when minuses repel one another, one need only put a plus in there, and when pluses repel one another, one need only put a minus in.
The problem is how to bring these in and put them into human beings who are carrying on conflict. One must grope out the problem of how to put a minus, if it be a minus, or a plus, if it be a plus, into body and mind, which are in a mutually contradictory position. To seek to present the method of resolving that problem before a humanity that has passed through a history of struggle of mind and body—to say it again, to put in either a plus or a minus before a humanity that is in a contradictory position—is a new doctrine and thought.
This new doctrine and thought is a religious thought, and this is a thought concerning God. It means that it is not a thought concerning man but a thought concerning God. It is not materialism but spiritualism. It is not humanism but Godism. It is to put in such a thought.
Therefore, what problem remains for humanity? The problem remains of how to come into contact with God one hundred percent. Then what must one do to come into contact with God one hundred percent? One must feel God’s heart one hundred percent and must live for God one hundred percent and must go one hundred percent to the place God desires.
The Problem Is How One Discerns Good and Evil
Humanity must be made to be equipped with one direction toward one world centering upon one purpose; and because it would not do for the distance between peoples to be far, He has connected the peoples, and centering upon east, west, south, and north, He has equipped the four directions and gathered even the countless religious people who are in between. And so now He is going forward to present one direction centering upon the four great religious cultural spheres. When all this time has passed, it becomes the Last Days.
Yet the Last Days seem to be coming, and it appears that we have almost arrived at the destination, but we cannot know about that destination. This is the problem. From this point we come to consider that the responsibility our church must fulfill today is great.
Then what is the problem here? It is how we, who are the dividing point of good and evil, discern good and evil. In discerning this, since you have come to the Unification Church, you must discern it from here. A person who cannot discern here cannot discern merely by going to America.
Then how does one discern here?
Though all are alike Unification Church members, the roads by which good and evil can be discerned are all different. They are of a thousand shapes and ten thousand forms. If there are a hundred, all hundred people are not alike. You must know this. It means that the types are all different, such as the type that stands in the east, the type that stands in the west, the type that stands in the south, and the type that stands in the north. Moreover, there are bound to be types of spring, summer, autumn, and winter there as well. Is it not so?
Seen centering upon a day, the morning corresponds to spring, and midday to summer, and evening to autumn, and night to winter. Likewise, a person too has boyhood, and youth, and the prime of life, and old age. For a person, spring is adolescence. Summer is in the thirties, and autumn is around the forties. After that one enters winter, and when one comes to correspond to the passing of the winter solstice, one dies. All reasoning is such. The four seasons are such, and a day is such.
In this way, human beings were born according to the law of heaven and earth. It means that the Book of Changes (주역, 周易) accords with reason. Everything is composed of yang and yin, and whether this is upper-and-lower yang and yin or left-and-right yang and yin is what is called the Four Images (사상, 四象). Seen from this perspective, people are all different. Jesus also set up three disciples and was equipped with the four directions of east, west, south, and north, centering upon Jesus. In this sense, the Four Position Foundation of which we have spoken does not depart from the reasoning of heavenly law.
Among you there are people of the eastern type, people of the western type, people of the southern type, and people of the northern type, all of them. Or there are people of spring, summer, autumn, and winter, all of them.
If there is a type frozen hard and cold as ice, there is also a type that is good merely to look at. A type that is always stately and can always stretch forth is a type of summer. A type that goes up quickly and comes down quickly is a type of autumn.
From this point, from the present position in which you yourselves are placed, you must without fail make yourselves one with that direction centering upon one purpose, and the problem is how you discern that direction. Therefore, one must first know what type one is. Especially, it means that this is necessary when unmarried young men and women marry.
If we look at spring and summer, spring goes seeking summer, but summer expels spring. It means that on one side it pushes away, but on the other side it carries out a work of drawing in. Is it not so? When a day passes, summer gradually draws nearer, but spring grows more distant. It means that on one side it pulls and on the other side it pushes away. Because this forms a circle, there is a road by which one can be revived; if it does not form a circle, it is a parting forever. Therefore, the universe operates by the law of the circle. That is why spring, summer, autumn, and winter must revolve. If one draws this upon a plane, it forms a sine curve.
In Distinguishing Good and Evil, Conflict Unfolds
You must first discern whether it is good or evil.
Where are good and evil?
Good and evil fill the world, but the dividing point at which good and evil must be discerned is you yourselves. You must know this. When it is said that the world is evil, a person who lives without conflict with that evil world is an evil person. It means that a person who says he lives without conflict with this world is an evil person. It means that a person who, while being within the fallen sphere, lives just as he is without raising a banner of revolt, like a fish caught in a net, is an evil person. When one ought to carry on conflict with the evil world, a person who lives just as he is is an evil person.
If one knows that the world in which one is now living is an evil world, one must raise a banner of revolt.
Then why did it become so? Because man fell. Because he fell and dropped to greet liberation, he cannot but rise again, and to rise, he must writhe. Just as one is, it will not do. Through such a person, one cannot greet the new world that humanity pursues and cannot expect the development of a new history and cannot leave behind a historical trace of goodness. Therefore, people who have come forth holding up goodness must struggle.
The communists assert that for history to develop, there must be struggle. They have come forth holding up dialectical materialism and the logic of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis (정반합, 正反合). Yet what that struggle is is a struggle of good and evil. Yet the communists did not know that it is a struggle for distinguishing good and evil. You must know this well.
Then from where must you yourselves of the Unification Church discern good and evil? You must discern it from within my mind and body. Which of my mind and body is good? Both are not good. Then which of these two is what can appear as the more good? It means that whoever one asks, they do not answer that they do not know. Even a three-year-old child, when asked which is better, the body or the mind, will answer that it is the mind.
Centering upon the mind, standing on the side of the mind, one must struggle against what does not accord with this. Otherwise, one cannot go seeking the origin of goodness. And when we look centering upon the mind, the mind that has developed further and is in the highest place, the final place, is precisely the absolute mind. That absolute mind is precisely God’s mind.
The Highest State in Which the Human Mind Is Developed
Because our mind itself is not perfect, to pursue a perfect mind, one must infinitely develop the world of the mind. The world of the mind is cosmic. This transcends the course of history.
What will the view of the world be, held from the standard of a developed mind? Have you thought about this? What will the world look like to one who becomes the master of a developed world of mind and beholds it? Though it be the same world, how differently will the world look when beheld from a developed position, from an awakened position, compared with the world seen with the eyes of an undeveloped time?
Will it be the same or different?
It means that this is entirely different. It means that it is as different as heaven and earth (천양지판, 天壤之判). It means that one can know that all under heaven is contained in every bird’s song that is heard and in every phenomenon that is seen. Would it not be so? It means that one worldwide sovereignty seen from such an open, free world of mind cannot but be so, whatever the sovereignty. If there is such a mind, it cannot but be so.
The more clearly one grasps the content of the value of a thing, the more the scope of it widens, and the more its height rises, the more the inner mind grows strong proportionally to it.
Then what is the state in which one can become strongest here? Sakyamuni said, “In heaven and on earth, I alone am honored.” It means that it can be so. It means that it must become so.
Why is that? It is enough if we human beings become a complete minus and become one with God, who is a complete plus. If a complete plus and a complete minus become one, since that cannot be two, it means, “I alone am honored.” It means that this is scientific. The age of saying that religion is unscientific has passed. How scientific it is! Since it is a purpose we must reach, ought it not to be scientific?
If it becomes so, God’s mind and man’s mind are exchanged. Man’s mind goes to God, and God’s mind comes to man. Plus and minus are exchanged. If only the mind is thus exchanged, it means that the body, which had been contradictory, sticks fast. Will it be so, or will it not? Though it was a body contradictory to our mind, if only it were exchanged in this way, would it stick fast or would it not? It sticks fast. This is scientific. It means that the body and mind becoming one is scientific.
Humanity Must Become One Mind Centering Upon the Heavenly Order
There is a word, “heavenly order” (천륜); have you heard the word “heavenly order”? The word “heavenly order” is a religious term. You have heard the words “human ethics” and “morality,” but you have not heard the words “heavenly ethics” and “morality,” have you? Then where is the origin of those human ethics and morality? Is it the Constitution of the Republic of Korea? If one digs into that origin, it is grounded in the conscience.
Today’s law was made upon the foundation of Roman law, and it may be said that Roman law became the underlying foundation of the culture of the present world; yet human ethics and morality are, to the very end, grounded in the conscience. It means the conscience rather than the law.
Then what is the basis of the conscience?
It is goodness. It takes goodness as its standard. When one departs from goodness and goes wrong, the conscience corrects that wrong. And to form a universal social system that can accord with the pure conscience, laws and ordinances, too, are necessary. So in the end, upon what are human ethics grounded? They are grounded upon the heavenly order.
There is no heavenly order that leaves out God. Yet who asserts, “I am the man among men”? There is no God or anything. ”Follow me” is Marxism. So today Marxism is running rampant, centering upon materialism, but this is a phenomenon of the end of the age. A doctrine centering upon matter is materialism, not humanism. Since there is not even personality, what humanism is it? It means that it cannot even enter into human ethics.
Among the saints until now, there has been no saint who left out Heaven. The saints without fail taught the way of Heaven. Confucius too taught Heaven. He taught, “Heaven gives blessings to the one who does good, and Heaven sends down calamity upon the one who does not do good,” that is, 위선자(爲善者)는 천보지이복(天報之以福)하고 위불선자(爲不善者)는 천보지이화(天報之以禍)니라.
What is Heaven (천, 天) here?
Though it is vague, it taught God. Jesus too is a saint because he taught God. Is it not so? Sakyamuni too taught Heaven. He said that every being has the Buddha-mind (불심, 佛心); and what is that Buddha-mind? It speaks of the pure original mind. Seen in this way, it means that there has been no saint who taught while omitting Heaven.
Humanity has been unfolding history centering upon this way of the heavenly order. It has been remaining. What does this say? It says that it has walked the road Heaven presents, following the way of the heavenly order. Yet the direction of the mind must be made to appear upon a straight line from the individual to the family, tribe, people, nation, and world so that one can go toward goodness. It means that this is the problem.
Your mind must communicate with the center. Your mind must be made one with the mind of history, and the individual’s mind must be made one with the family’s mind and made one with the tribe’s mind and made one with the people’s mind and made one with the nation’s mind and made one with the world’s mind. If only these were made.
Does your world of mind develop? That the mind is good is the same for anyone. Though the characters of woman and man differ, the direction in which their minds go is the same. The words “conscientious” or “unconscientious” can be said of both woman and man. One can say of anyone, “That woman is conscientious. That man is unconscientious.” In saying “conscientious,” there is universal and common content. It means that at this point there is unity. And it is the same for people of old and people of now. From where must that direction be made? Do not seek to do it while living alone; one must set out that way from the first.
You may say, “With whom do I live?
I live alone, but I must live together with the world. We have come to a point when we must do so all the more. Until now we have not lived forming relationships with the world, but from now on we must live forming relationships. Today the people of the Republic of Korea, too, perhaps say, “Where shall I live but in the Republic of Korea?” but they must live together with the world. Now is such a time. The world is gradually drawing toward one sphere of life.
What Makes Our Body and Mind One
For humanity today the problem is how to find one subjectivity of mind by which the whole of humanity can be bound, a subjectivity that all can acknowledge. And there must be content by which that subjectivity can be asserted. The view of the personal character of the individual centering upon that subjectivity, the value of the individual, the value of the family, the value of the tribe, the value of the people, the value of the nation, and the value of the world are all alike. Therefore, however great the value of the world may be, it cannot be exchanged for the individual. Because the value of that world comes forth through the individual. Is it not so? Now three billion humans live in this world, but those three billion humans came about by the joining of one person and one person.
Such a subjective standard of character must be established, but in establishing such a standard of character it is impossible with us human beings ourselves alone today. Therefore, one must again be sent from Heaven. This is the thought of the Second Advent, or the messianic thought, remaining in various religions today.
Then what does that Messiah come and do? It is not that he alone will live well. Of course he himself must live well, but he must make his family, tribe, people, nation, and world all able to live well.
When, with such a subjective personal character centering upon the conscience, one that can stand in the world’s stead, he presents before our body a natural environment of life rather than a compulsory environment of life, our body can completely submit to it.
What makes our body and mind one?
And what makes man and woman one? One might perhaps say, “What makes them one? They simply become one as they are,” but what makes man and woman one is love. Love is the power that makes them join. It is simple. Love is the power that makes man and woman one. What is it to love one another completely? It is that he is within me and I am within him. It is just as Paul, after having a spiritual experience, said that he did not know whether he was in the body or outside the body.
With what shall subject and object be bound?
Shall they be bound with a rope? For one man and one woman simply to meet in any way at all and live is not love. Love is when the directions match and the constitution and the foundation match. As one is plus and one is minus and they become a complete relative relationship, love is that one can say, “I need you to death, and you need me to death.” When they are thus completely bound and become one, because two personalities join and are equipped with one personality, they come to be able to manifest a value of more than two people. Then they become masters who can build a world of a higher dimension.
Human beings ought to become so, but when we look at people today, it means that it is not so. Now in the world, hippies have come out and are swaggering about. It means that they cannot even dream of a relative ideology for connecting a subjectivity by which they can form a relationship with a better world. Such a world perishes. Considering this perspective, you must become people who hold such subjectivity.
Then with what shall human ethics and the heavenly heart be joined?
With what shall body and mind be joined?
With man alone, they absolutely cannot be joined. Yet if the heavenly heart participates there, they stick fast together. Therefore, God is necessary for us human beings. It means that God’s love is necessary.
That is why Jesus too said,
“Love the Lord thy God more than anyone. This is the first commandment.”
He taught it well. It means that loving God is the first commandment. You must consider the content of this first commandment.
Discern Good and Evil: Centering Upon the Mind
The starting point in discerning good and evil is “I.” It means that it is you yourselves. Then from where must one set out as the origin? It is the mind. One must discern, taking the mind as the origin. If one remains just as one is in the fallen world, one is evil. A person who is born in an evil world and lives just as he is is bound for hell. One must buy the conscience ticket nearest to goodness and go to the Kingdom of Heaven. One must set up a standard of salvation and go. The individual must be so, and the family, tribe, people, and world must be so.
That standard must be a standard that all the people of the world can call right. That publicly recognized standard must be a standard of which it can be said that no one, whatever, can change it. Centering upon that standard, the peace of the world can sprout. From there the individual of goodness, the family of goodness, the tribe of goodness, the people of goodness, the nation of goodness, and the world of goodness can set out.
Yet, however good a nation may be, when it cannot match the worldwide standard and direction, that nation breaks apart. Therefore, what becomes a problem for us is doctrine and thought. It means that the view of the universe and the view of the world, and the view of life and the view of living, and the view of personal character of a new world become problems.
You gather with people whose minds match. To speak in terms of fish, minnows gather with minnows, loaches with loaches, eels with eels, and catfish with catfish; kinds whose shapes are similar and whose living environments are the same gather with their kind.
Likewise, people gather with people whose minds match, and Unification Church members too gather with Unification Church members. Yet one must not seek to apply to the whole what is centered upon themselves. That is factionalism. You must know that.
Then from where is Satan watching for us?
If we are moving, centering upon God and moving within God’s sphere of protection, that is no problem.
For us to develop centering upon goodness, we must break through evil. For that, one must without fail struggle. As we struggle, what attacks in here is Satan.
Through what opening does Satan attack?
You must know that. Satan attacks through your body. Therefore, before your mind, the body is Satan. It becomes so. Do you understand? Likewise, before a man, the woman is Satan, and before a woman, the man is Satan. You must know that what is in such a relative position is always the easiest to become Satan. That is why the word of the Bible says that the members of your household are your enemies.
Seen centering upon the mind, what is the body?
Is it a member of the same household or not? It means that it is a member of the same household. It means that body and mind are the same as members of one household. Considering the words that the members of your household are your enemies, for a husband the wife is an enemy, and for a wife the husband is an enemy. Seen centering upon the individual, before the mind, the body is an enemy, and before the body, the mind is an enemy.
In order that these not become enemies to one another, God must come in there and occupy it. God’s heart must come in and occupy it. In that sense the Unification Church speaks of God’s heart. With what does one make the body one with the mind? With what can one make them one?
Look. Even though the body has grown old and is about to die, does the mind tell the body to go out and work and sacrifice for the nation? Or does it look after the body’s circumstances and tell it to rest comfortably at home and eat and live? Is there a person who has a mind that says to rest comfortably at home? Even though the body has grown old, the mind urges it to go out and work. That is unmistakable. So these are not friends to one another but enemies.
If there were in the world a child who treated his parents so, would he be an unfilial child or a filial child?
If a child did so toward his aged parents, that would be unfilial. Moreover, if a subject did so toward his sovereign, he would become a treacherous subject. In the world there is a great deal of this.
Seen from that perspective, it means that your body and mind have split apart. Seen centering upon the body, the mind is an enemy. The body is a stage of evil, and the mind is a stage of goodness.
If one would cultivate a stage of goodness in the midst of this stage of evil, one must come forth holding up the way of Heaven, that is, the way of the heavenly order. Is it not so? One must develop heart in the world of the individual’s mind and widen its scope to the bond of the heavenly order. To say it again, it means that one must widen it from an individual view of living to a family, tribal, national, state, and worldwide view of living.
Become a Unification Church That Is for the World
A saint teaches the way that is for the world. There is no saint who teaches a way of being loyal only to his nation. Such a person is not a saint but a great man. Is General Yi Sun-sin, the loyal subject of the Republic of Korea, a loyal subject in America as well? Is he a loyal subject in Japan as well? In Japan, he is an enemy. He is a loyal subject and a great man only in the Republic of Korea. Yet a saint is regarded as more than a loyal subject in the Republic of Korea and regarded as more than a loyal subject in Japan and America as well. He is regarded as more than a loyal subject, transcending the nation. This is unmistakable. Why is that? It is because they taught the way of Heaven and because they introduced Heaven. Their teaching was not centered upon their people but worldwide. It means that they came forth with a way whose origin was a thought transcending the nation. That is, it means that they came bearing the content of Heaven.
Jesus died wretchedly upon the hill of Calvary at the hands of those people. Even the disciples whom he loved betrayed him. They forsook Jesus and went, in the manner of saying, “Die if you would die and leave off if you would leave off; do as you please.”
How is it that such a Jesus made the sphere of Christian thought that moves this democratic world today?
It is because at that time Jesus, crossing beyond the people of Israel, died for God and for the world’s humanity. That humanity is not the trifling world’s humanity living upon this earth. It is the humanity of the future, the humanity of longing that man can go seeking. Is that right or wrong? A saint is not a person who takes his nation as his principal thing.
That Jesus prayed, “Abba, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me,” was as a Jew.
It was words spoken in the sense of, “Was not Thy toiling for four thousand years to make the people of Israel a chosen people and thereby find one nation? Yet if that nation disappears, what will become of it? Yet it means that Jesus did not know that it was God’s Will to save the world even though that nation should disappear.
From that point, the Unification Church too must not be a Unification Church that takes the Unification Church as its principal thing. It must be a Unification Church that takes the world as its principal thing. The Republic of Korea too, if it takes only the Republic of Korea as its principal thing, will at some time perish. Yet if it is a Republic of Korea that is for the world of the future, it means that it does not perish.
The conscience appears with infinite value when it is for the whole. Therefore, you will have a mind to wish to build brick houses or Western-style houses for the thirty million people of the Republic of Korea, and to buy each of them a car, and to do everything for them as one wishes to do.
Do you have such a mind, or not?
Such a mind can change. A conscientious person will say he will do such work first as money comes in. Yet even though one has done all such work, the conscience does not say that since one has greeted the day of the sixtieth-birthday feast, from now on one should eat well and dress well and live at home.
It goes beyond the Republic of Korea to the world. When one sees such a thing, the mind seems like the greatest tyrant among tyrants. Yet because it must be so to be equipped with infinite personal character and go seeking that world of the eternal heart of the heavenly order, that world of the sovereignty of goodness, the mind always treats us like a tyrant. Is this a bad thing or a thankful thing? If it is thankful, it means do as the mind bids.
Such a thing is needed in our Unification Church too. We are neither democracy nor communism. Then what doctrine is it? It is Cosmosism. In Cosmos-ism, the character “ju” is not the character for lord (주, 主) as in democracy. It is the character for house (주, 宙). Can God live in this nation? He cannot live here. This nation must become the Cosmos (천주, 天宙), that is, God’s house. It is a commotion because this has not come about. It means that it is a commotion because the master has left the house.
A house from which the master has departed is the same as a house of mourning. Moreover, it is the same as the position of a widow or a widower. However magnificent that house may be, it is incomplete, a half. However good that house may be, it is not something to boast of. In a house one must attend to the master.
When it is asked whether there is a master in your mind, it seems there is a master of the mind, does it not? If there were no master of the mind, one would go back and forth because one does not know the direction. Do you know whether to go east or to go west? Yet the original mind knows. Therefore, there is a master.
That you are living here now is living for the sake of a thousand years. Do you understand? Because you live within this limited sphere of a day, you do not know it well, but you are living for the sake of a thousand years and ten thousand years.
If one lives for the sake of a thousand years and ten thousand years, those thousand years and ten thousand years must praise him. Yet when it is asked whether you have such value, by no means. It means that it is not so. Why? Because you have not fulfilled your responsibility.
The Standard for Distinguishing True Religion and False Religion
Mind and body are the closest to one another. And where was it said that the dividing point of good and evil lies? It was said that it lies between mind and body. It means that there is a boundary line, the dividing line.
Where did I say the dividing line is?
It means that it is in me. One side is the good side, and one side is the evil side. Yet when one looks at the good side, it is pitch dark. The conscience is the good side, is it not? When one looks into the conscience, is it bright or is it dark? It means that it is pitch dark, as though wrapped in fog. Yet when one looks at the body, how is it? Is it bright or dark? It is bright. It means that it is arranged in this way. Yet one cannot but look at what is dark rather than what is bright. Why? Because what is dark is the road of goodness.
Therefore, religion teaches one to deny what is bright. A religion that does not teach so is false. Look at the way of religion. No religion teaches one to eat well and live well alone and fleece others as one pleases. It is the opposite. It teaches everyone to go down, to deny the world completely. Is religion arranged so, or is it not? Young people will probably not know well what a true religion is. Yet what is not so cannot even be counted among religions.
If the Unification Church were to become a true religion, it must deny anything whatever. How far must one deny? One must deny even the love of parents, the love of husband and wife, and the love of children. This is the Unification Church. At last, one must be able to deny even human ethics and morality.
It means loving God more than anyone, more than your sons and daughters. You must clearly know that whether one can make everything be denied, even without anyone compelling it, becomes the standard for distinguishing whether it is a religion that can remain to the very last. If it is a religion in which that is not possible, one must go seeking a religion in which it is possible.
If it is not a place of grace in which my mind can trust, and in which I can feel ideal and love and heart, and can hold infinite value, and in which I can constitute inner personal character, one must pack one’s bundle and set out again seeking another place. It means that one must deny it. Is that not so?
Now there is much rumor in the world about the Unification Church. It is said that if one enters the Unification Church, one must do something called the Blessing…. Yes. It means that one must do it again. How does one do it? “How does one do it? We do it in our own way.” I do not reply to such talk.
Do you think I do not do it because I do not know how?
Though I know it well, there are many times when I do not do it because it is trifling. A time will come when I teach all such things. In this mottled world there are many unpleasant matters. Yet concerning that, anyone, whatever, must receive education from Teacher Moon of the Unification Church. The president of a nation, too, and the historical saints Confucius and Sakyamuni and Jesus, too, must come to me and learn that.
Concerning such problems, one must without fail present content of which anyone, whatever, can say that it is so. One must present a world of heart of a higher dimension. Otherwise, one cannot clear away what is blocked in darkness in the world of our mind. It will not do with your love, that is, worldly love. Without a love beyond that, what is blocked does not burst open.
Then is there a road that can be such, or is there not? There is. Therefore, a person who truly knows the Unification Church is an unhappy person.
How many people are there who truly know the Unification Church?
In the Teacher’s view, there are not many. In the course of our Unification Church's history until now, there have been all sorts of people. There were also people who sought to get ahead in the world by using the Unification Church Principle, but look at whether those people got ahead. It means that they were all caught up and fell. You must know that.
Become a Subject Who Distinguishes Good and Evil
I, who am the dividing point of good and evil, am the problem. Then what must I do? I must become a subject who can distinguish good and evil.
Otherwise, one cannot lead the evil world and make a world of goodness. Is that not so? Can one do so while unable even to discern good and evil? Therefore, it means that I must become a subject of goodness. Even at the cost of my one body collapsing, I must by whatever means become a subject of goodness.
Then what sort of place is that place?
You must know this. In this evil world, what sort of place is the subjective place in which, night or day, one can raise a relative history of resurrection centering upon the subjectivity of goodness and thereby develop the sphere of goodness? Moreover, what sort of place is the place at which all the people of the world look up? It means that it is the same. A person who is praised by the multitudes of the world is a person who, upon entering his house, is harmonious with his brothers and is filial before his parents and is kind to his relatives and shows kindness to the people of his village. One must be able to be such a person.
It means that your minds must go as far as a state that can be such. It is the same with Teacher Moon of the Unification Church. Does the Teacher accord with such a principle or not? Or does God like the Teacher or not like him? It means that it is all the same. Moreover, it is the same centering upon the spirit; individuals of the spirit world too. When one becomes distant from all such things, one perishes. However excellent one may be, one perishes.
Until now I have reared our Unification Church members, and they give no thought to it at all. You must be able to say that it is all right even if I give you no thought for a thousand years and ten thousand years. That I give no thought to it does not become a calamity to him but sets him up in a place where he can receive blessings in my stead. Do you understand what I mean?
If you hold such a mind and go forward unchangingly for one year, two years, or three years, you will without fail become a subject. What does not change remains eternally. What is unchanging remains eternally. From this perspective, you of the Unification Church must become subjects of goodness. Then what must one do? It is to become a filial son and filial daughter centering upon God, just as one likes a person in the world. Do you understand?
A crowd that whispers among brothers and forms factions is Satan. A crowd that seeks to form factions, saying so-and-so is thus and so-and-so is thus, is Satan. In walking the road of the Will, you will meet all sorts of people. There are many thieves here too. Moreover, there are many fellows who seek to swindle. Truly, there are all sorts of people.
Therefore, what sort of person is a person of God?
He is a person who sacrifices himself. Yet a person who, having bought and given something to his younger brother, browbeats him, saying, “I bought and gave you this, so it is good, is it not? Must I be equal with you, or must I be above you? An unfilial child in that household. He is a person who seeks to display what he has done. Such a person is Satan.
In the Unification Church too, some people go about clamoring, “Teacher Moon of the Unification Church is such and such, and I am such and such.” How many such people have there been until now! Yet those who depart from the principle are all broken off. If you too wish to follow such people, it means all of you go and follow them. Even if all follow them, the Teacher does not perish.
What one moves centering upon is important. What is the Unification Church to move centering on? Is it being equipped with God’s personal character of heart? To say it again, it is whether one is striving from a deep welling up within one’s inner heart even without my asserting anything. If one uses means and methods and orders people about, saying this and that, there is no law by which anything remains.
Consider it yourselves. You must know how to discern all problems centering upon the principle. It means that you must know how to appraise them, centering upon God. You must become filial sons and filial daughters of God and be affectionate among brothers. You must love. It means that the elder brother must center on the younger brother himself. To compel, saying instead, “I am better than you, so follow me,” is a method Satan uses. One must beware of such crowds.
How many such people have there been until now! This lady here too sought to follow such a crowd and then came back. Seeing that, many people have become pitiful. Though I know that one person and two persons are packing their bundles and running away, I quietly leave it and watch. Such people will, at some time without fail, be broken off. All of you, you must know this. Do you understand?
I Am the Dividing Point of Good and Evil
To distinguish good and evil is exceedingly difficult. A person who cannot distinguish good and evil easily perishes if he communes with the spirit world. It means that if one, from a position of not knowing the direction and not knowing one’s own position and not knowing the whole, only peers into the spirit world, one perishes. The Teacher, standing in this place until now, has absolutely not spoken about the spirit world. When one puts it into practice and it accords with all reasoning, one comes to understand. That is why people who commune with the spirit world at a high level come and bear witness.
The Teacher has not stepped forth saying, “The Unification Church is thus and Teacher Moon is thus…” Though the Teacher has been hated and opposed by the pastors and elders of the established churches until now, he does not oppose them. One must wait until one greets Heaven’s time. Until then, one must not assert oneself.
These days some people say that God too is incomplete. They say that God too develops. One must not speak such stuff. If God developed, what would become of it? This is to make God a communist. To be absolute is to be complete. When there is nothing complete, to pursue completeness is a delusion. Having learned trifling things….
If you would run into such a place and wag your tails, then all of you go and die. If that is good, pack your bundles and all of you go! Such trifling things…. It means that they deceive people with honeyed words and carry them off.
A person who has come forth having received a heavenly mandate, a person who has come forth having received God’s commission, is different from the time he was born. Even so, one must not boast of one’s position. If one boasts, it is stolen.
You do not know the Teacher. It is because I do not speak. The Teacher possesses what you could not know, though you sought for a thousand years. Yet I do not speak of it. That is why I get on with being the Teacher. You always think it is the end, but it is not the end. You must know this. Therefore, you must come to your senses.
I am the dividing point of good and evil. It means do not resent others. Satan is always beside us. Day or night, there is always the possibility of coming into contact with Satan. One’s own wife can become Satan. Do you think that just because she is a Blessed wife, she is always on Heaven’s side? By no means.
If there is a time of going up, there is a time of going down. Because it is relative, danger is always interposed. You must know that until this fallen world is entirely restored and God can rule this world, Satan is always watching for you from the closest place.
In walking this road until now, I have not held a mind of seeking revenge upon those who opposed me, nor prayed that they die. The Teacher thinks that he suffers the damage and pays the price in their stead. He thinks that the Teacher’s household or our Association must pay that price. Even though there may be a time when it could be so, I believe that it is a time of crossing beyond that time. Yet trifling fellows say this and that. It means that the Teacher’s way of thinking is different from such people’s. That is why, if one errs even a little, one becomes Satan. You must know this well.
Then from whom did they receive their education?
They learned the Unification doctrine and said this and that. From whom did they learn all that? Did they not learn it from the Teacher? Teacher Moon of the Unification Church did not learn from anyone whatsoever. I have no teacher.
If they learned it, they ought to take responsibility for what they learned; yet since they take another’s goods and treat them as their own, what are they? It means that they are thieves. A thief is nothing else. A thief is a person who takes another’s things and treats them as his own. What is Satan? Satan is what cannot return Heaven’s things to Heaven but makes them its own. It means that it regards them as its own. All of you, you must make this clear. Wait and see about such people. They are all so arranged as to perish.
The Teacher has been to prison and has come back and has come forth, being driven and driven, but that he remains is because he did it according to this principle. He cannot but be a filial son before that Father, can he not? It is only that they do not know; those who know greet the Teacher when he passes by. The Teacher is such a person. In the end, one must stand in a position that God can always affirm. If one steps forth of oneself first, it means that one is struck down. That is why the Teacher does not readily step forth into public seats. The Teacher has come forth in this way until now. And until now there have been all sorts of fellows.
The Unification Church’s Responsibility for This Age
Hereafter, the Unification Church will be opposed by the three great religions. It will without fail pass through such a process. Crowds that oppose me will also come out. It means that they will definitely come out. Yet that does not mean that I intend to do anything to them. It means trying to oppose. It means trying to do everything. Go as far as you will go. To see how far it goes….
You must become loyal subjects of the nation. Human history until now has regarded loyal subjects as important. Then what sort of person is a loyal subject? A loyal subject is a person who, in a national emergency, goes out into the place of death and makes all difficulties his own and gives his life in the nation’s stead and walks the road of death.
Likewise, a person who witnesses centering upon Heaven is a loyal subject before Heaven. It is divided according to whether one witnesses centering upon oneself or witnesses centering upon God. This can be known at once.
Therefore, the individual, if it be an individual, and the family itself, if it be a family, must live for humanity. It means let us live for humanity. One must not think, “Since I too am a Blessed Family, it will be all right to use the church.” Yet the church is not used. Heaven too absolutely is not used. If one seeks to do so, one is split off. It means that, eventually, one is split off.
Then what must the Unification Church itself do?
The road the Unification Church must go is the road of sacrificing for the people. This is the orthodox teaching. And these people must sacrifice for the world.
Because this is the orthodox road that God has taught, I guide you in this way today. Does that mean that the Teacher seeks to be in debt to you? Absolutely not. I absolutely will not be in debt to you. I grit my teeth and seek not to be in debt. If one likes to be in debt, one perishes.
Because the mind of the people communicates with the mind of Heaven, it means that people without fail know. Accordingly, you must know the dividing point of good and evil from your individual selves and separate good and evil, and further must separate good and evil in the family as well. And our church itself must play the role of a dividing point that separates good and evil in this age. Then one can cross beyond this society and this nation and go forth toward the world.
One must advance stage by stage. There, if it be an individual, there is a fight as an individual, and if it be a family, there is a fight as a family, and if it be a tribe, there can be a fight as a tribe. Therefore, if it be a family, centering upon the family, and if it be a tribe, centering upon the tribe, one must settle the decision of good and evil.
If one would go forth toward society and toward the nation, centering upon the church, one must without fail settle the decision of good and evil, centering upon the church. One must pass through the dividing point of good and evil. A body that does not clearly know that dividing point cannot remain.
From that point, the Teacher has a responsibility to teach the road the Unification Church must go. He has a responsibility to teach you a direction by which good and evil can be judged. Therefore, what the Teacher says is not something said arbitrarily, nor something said by chance. It is inevitable. Therefore, when the Teacher’s words come to have a relative relationship with the world situation, it can become a Unification Church that is for the world.
Yet even though the Teacher speaks centering upon the age, you do not know. Only after it has passed do you say, “So that was it.” From the 1970s, a time will come when the Unification Church laughs. Such a time will without fail come. Why is that? It means that it is because, in the 1970s, the Teacher himself stands at the highest dividing point. That is why he devotes every sincerity.
It means, as for you, do it if you will do it and leave off if you will leave off. It means that I at least must go. In discerning left and right before God, it is enough if only two people follow.
If only you can discern left and right, you can take hold of the direction. For that, one must here greet the heavenly fortune and offer devotion and combine the inner and outer environment.
Then when is the dividing point of the Unification Church?
In passing through the dividing point, according to the person, a period of three years, seven years, twenty years, or thirty years is needed. There is only a difference of long or short in that period; that one must pass through that dividing point is the same.
Blessed Families, Who Must Expand the Sphere of Goodness
You must be able to discern the time. It means that the 1970s are a time when the Unification Church can exert influence over these people and this society. Until now, we have had to take a low posture. Because the Teacher knew that it was such a time, and because he knew that the Blessed Families must stand at the head before the nation and the church, he has, at this time, mobilized the families.
It means try going forth in this way for just three more years, until the year 1972. To see what becomes of it…. If it will not do, I will make it so even by striking. If one says one cannot go out to witness because one’s circumstances are thus and one’s environment is thus, I press in more and more. Where is the road we must go? We must be equipped with such a direction ideologically and become one. We must move the whole thirty million people.
No one and nothing whatever can cut off the road we must go. In this nation too, the government of President Park is stepping forth to root out corruption. If only the Unification Church enters here, it will without fail be resolved.
If one presents a method, saying this should be done thus and that should be done thus, it means that it is possible. You must know, considering the present actual state of the nation, in what sort of position we are.
Today we must respect this heaven-given mission that God has entrusted to us and must be able to hold pride and submit before that mission. If one bears that responsibility, one can transcend the individual and can transcend the family, tribe, and people.
Now is an age in which the special privilege has been given of being able, centering upon one’s lifetime, to transcend the four stages of individual, family, tribe, and people and to pursue infinite value before a national mission. A person who loses this age of grace is an exceedingly foolish person. Taking such a sphere of grace as one’s foundation, one can cross over to the world.
If one holds one’s conviction centering upon this, there is a road by which one can go forth to the world even without following the Teacher directly. Yet even though one has arrived at the world without bearing a worldwide cross and crossing beyond a worldwide standard, one cannot greet liberation.
Seen from this perspective, the dividing point of good and evil must set out from me as an individual and advance to the family, people, nation, and world.
Therefore, with you individually alone, who bears the mission of world restoration, it absolutely will not do. With Blessed Families alone, it absolutely will not do.
Taking the whole as the principal thing, one must keep joint step and go in one direction. Without rising when the wave is high and going low when it is low, matching the rise and fall and height and depth of the wave, and becoming a body of the same destiny, you cannot walk the road you must go.
You must know that we are within a sphere of privileged fortune in which, from a position where the individual direction, the family direction, and the national direction are made one, my individual victory can be connected to the victory of the world.
Therefore, I too must not consider myself to be an I limited to the individual. It is an I made one with the whole. The sovereign of the Republic of Korea, too, must be a sovereign who stands in the midst of the Republic of Korea.
And so he must hold a mind that only when the whole is pleased can he himself be pleased and that if the whole is not pleased, he will sacrifice himself.
If one goes forward holding such a mind, one will always be able to go forward as a subject in distinguishing good and evil. I hope that you will certainly not lose the direction you must go, but widen the dividing point of good and evil environmentally. I hope that you will not become stragglers here. You understand, do you not? (“Yes.”)
