Inquiry: The Philosopher's Stone

"Our life is not as we imagine it." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 167, 10:2

"The transfer value of one true idea has no end or limit." -- A Course in Miracles; Manual for Teachers 5, II, 4:5

"The Truth is true, and nothing else is true. Truth cannot have an opposite." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 152, 3:1, 5

Webster defines inquiry as "an examination into facts or principles." Inquiry-based learning advocates define inquiry as "a seeking for truth." Both definitions are apt... for only the inquiring mind can find its way out of the maze of its own making. Only inquiry can shed light on the fact that all concepts are invented, relative, and therefore neither true nor false. Concepts are all simply stories. Only inquiry can lead us past all mental constructs to the Truth behind it all.

You can state the basis for all inquiry very simply... that if Truth exists, it exists as Principle, and is the Ground of Being. So that means that we can inquire and question literally everything that comes and goes... and what remains is what is True. The ancient alchemists used the metaphor of pure gold for Truth, and the philosopher's stone represented the ability to turn base metal into gold. This is what inquiry will do with any situation or concept. If we're willing to question, and to forgive and release what is clearly relative judgement, we sooner or later experience the pure gold of direct Awareness of Truth, the direct experience of our changeless Self. As the poet Rumi put it so beautifully, "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about."

Why is inquiry so discouraged in our world? Our educational system discourages inquiry and extols indoctrination and memorization of pre-packaged ideology and concepts. Our cultures and religions, all of them, are based on the normalization of indoctrination. Questioning is regarded, at best, as weird and reserved for intellectuals. At worst it's seen as blasphemous or unpatriotic or just plain evil. For obvious reasons. Remember the story of the Emperor's New Clothes? All the stories and myths and traditions and beliefs of culture depend on not questioning.

When Jesus walked in the dream we call the world, he walked and lived as other people do. The difference is he knew none of it was true. He felt no compulsion to wash his hands at certain times, or eat only certain things... and this threatened many people who believed those ways of thinking and doing things were sacred. He moved in the world, but he was most definitely questioning every mental construct and human belief all the time. He showed us that God is the real meaning of everything. And this he came to teach us.

If God is the real meaning of everything, what is there to fear in questioning everything that seems limited or unlike God? If you strip away every illusion, what remains must be the Truth. This is the purpose of true inquiry... and like the ancient alchemists with their philosopher's stone, when we practice inquiry faithfully we are rewarded with the gold of pure Truth.

"Nothing the world believes is true." -- A Course in Miracles; Workbook Lesson 139, 7:1