Extracted text
Editorial transcription, lightly normalized from the scan. Line-break hyphenation, spacing, capitalization, and unmistakable OCR errors have been repaired; the claims remain those of The Flaming Sword.
"(1) By accident I have before me the outside cover only of one of your papers, THE FLAMING SWORD. I am curious to know how you make it appear that the sun is in the center of the earth, after admitting that the earth is only a few thousand miles in diameter. I suppose you admit that the distance from the sun to any part of the earth is some millions of miles. (2) I should also like to know how celibacy can make the mortal body immortal."
To the modern mind the Koreshan Cosmogony is full of surprises. Its conclusions are startling, and at every turn one finds that there is a radical departure from the Copernican system. One coming in contact with the Koreshan Astronomy should not expect to make a single conclusion fit some preposterous conclusion of modern scientists. Modern astronomy is wholly wrong; its every conclusion is fallacious, for the simple reason that its premise is false.
Koreshan Astronomy is not merely a radical departure from the old astronomy; it is its exact antithesis or opposite. The supposition that the heavens envelop the earth—that all of the heavenly bodies so called lie outside of and remote from this mundane sphere, completely perverts every fact of observed phenomena, and forces upon the mind numerous ridiculous and extremely absurd conclusions.
The sun is not some millions of miles from the earth. Astronomers have thought so, because they make false applications of the principles of astronomical triangulation. If the earth were a convex and a solid body rotating on its axis and revolving about the sun, it would necessarily follow that the astronomer's estimate of the sun's distance might approximate the true distance. But their angles are supposititious. They are not looking outward from the earth, but inward. The open space of the universe does not surround the earth, but constitutes the earth's hollow or concavity. Therefore, all the so called heavenly bodies are contained within the earth.
From the basis of the facts of astronomical observation, applying the principles of trigonometry to the concave side of the earth, we compute the distance to the visible orb of day to be only about 900 miles, instead of something over 90,000,000 of miles. In making astronomical measurements, it makes all the difference in the world whether the perpendiculars or plumbs at right angles with the true levels everywhere, converge beneath our feet or over our heads.
We maintain, from the basis of the application of the principles of analogy, comparative anatomy, and direct test of the earth's contour, that the center of the earth is above our heads, and that all perpendiculars converge above at the center of the earth, which is about 4,000 miles from the earth's concave surface.
The hollow of the earth contains three principal atmospheres, the lowest and outermost of which is our sea of air. Owing to the difference in degrees of density and refractive power of the atmospheres, it is impossible for the mortal eye to see beyond the upper stratum of our atmosphere, which has a depth of about 1,000 miles. All the stars and planets, the sun and moon, and comets and meteors when visible, are in our sea of atmosphere of oxygen and nitrogen.
Therefore the visible sun, which has an orbit, only about 900 miles from the earth's surface, and within its hollow, is not located at the center of the earth; but at the center is the central sun, with its absorptive and reflective hemispheres. The visible sun is the projection or refocalization of the light emitted from the center.
(2) True celibacy, involving actual continence of the males and chastity of the females, conserves the vital energies of life. These energies are dissipated in the ordinary sex relations.
Celibacy is but a stepping-stone; it is one of the conditions necessary to entrance into the immortal plane of existence. Celibacy per se, without the operation of other vital factors, will not transform the mortal body. There must be something done with the energies conserved. Utilization of the conserved energies requires polarization; and this necessitates knowledge and application of the Messianic law.
Celibacy admits of the generation of a surplus of vitality, which may be polarized in an object of supreme affection; therefore the first commandment to love the Lord thy God with all the heart and mind and soul. The Messianic center is essential; the Lord God is the God-Man, the High Priest of sacrifice, the tangible pole of the transforming power.
Around such a center there may be grouped the thousands in the way of preparation for the great work of attainment of immortality. Salvation from mortality involves the work of the Almighty, in the formulation of a great biologic battery preparatory to the great baptism or outpouring of vitality from the personal point of polarity. Between the mortal and the immortal states is the translation of groups of men and women who espouse the cause of celibacy and communism, in recognition of the Messianic law and the Messianic personality.
The Koreshan Unity is the great system of organic effort that is to bring about the greatest miracle of the ages—the putting on of immortality in the flesh.
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The source scans remain the record. This page preserves the periodical's argument and reported observations without presenting its conclusions as independently established results. The claims remain attributed to The Flaming Sword.
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The Flaming Sword · Vol. 19, No. 50 · · PDF p. 12