1976A Course in Miracles (also referred to as ACIM or the Course) is a 1976 book by Helen Schucman.
Helen Cohn SchucmanHelen SchucmanHelen Cohn SchucmanDiedFebruary 9, 1981 (aged 71) New York CityNationalityAmericanOccupationProfessor of medical psychology, Columbia UniversityKnown forA Course In Miracles (ACIM)3 more rows
1976A Course in Miracles / Originally published
Course in Miracles SocietyProduct DetailsISBN-13:9780976420057Publisher:Course in Miracles SocietyPublication date:05/28/2009Pages:663Sales rank:39,5621 more row
In this teaching Eckhart explores A Course in Miracles, a widely popular book of universal spiritual teachings. Don't lose your mind in the concepts of reality, it's time to become the moment. In this teaching Eckhart explores A Course in Miracles, a widely popular book of universal spiritual teachings.
The modern spiritual teaching and path, A Course in Miracles, contains hundreds of reference to the Bible, and both the New Testament and the Course claim to present Jesus' teachings. There is an obvious and important relationship between the Course and the Bible, and how the two relate is a natural question.
The Message of A Course in Miracles is a paragraph-by-paragraph translation of the Course into plain, everyday language which brings its loving message to the surface so that you can attain a deeper understanding of it faster. It is for anyone seeking a simple and clear means for attaining lasting inner peace.
ACIM. Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.
“Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists.” These profound words sum up the contemporary scripture, A Course in Miracles. In this inspired companion to the Course, we discover that fear and thought are the same — the source of personal problems and social conflict.
The Message of A Course in Miracles is a paragraph-by-paragraph translation of the Course into plain, everyday language which brings its loving message to the surface so that you can attain a deeper understanding of it faster. It is for anyone seeking a simple and clear means for attaining lasting inner peace.
ACIM. Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing.
3:0611:28How to Apply A Course in Miracles in your Daily Life - YouTubeYouTubeStart of suggested clipEnd of suggested clipIt's about the experience of a way to live our lives and to apply the principles of an open-hearted.MoreIt's about the experience of a way to live our lives and to apply the principles of an open-hearted. Perspective whether it's in our work. Whether it's in our relationships.
669 pagesThis edition is the new 3rd edition by the original publisher. The text is 669 pages, with a 488-page workbook for students with a lesson for each day that clarifies the very complex text, a 92-page manuel for teachers, and a 22-page supplement.
Germany’s New Christian Endeavour Academy, a registered association, last year published extracts from A Course in Miracles, originally published in 1975 , on its website. The association argued that Schucman had not considered herself the author of the work, and referred to a 2003 ruling by a New York court that it said had put the work into the public domain.
A German court ruled in 2014 that Jesus Christ did not , in fact, write “A Course In Miracles” despite the fact the the jewish author Helen Schucman claimed that He did, and despite the fact that she legally transferred ownership of the copyright to the jewish-controlled and operated Foundation for Inner Peace:
So Helen Schucman and The Foundation for Inner Peace have apparently made millions off of her claim that Jesus channeled “A Course in Miracles” directly to her, but of course, if that were true, and these truly were the direct words of Christ, neither she nor the Foundation would claim ownership of those words, as they would be public domain, like the Bible itself. But these Jews want to have their cake and eat it too — they want to continue to make money off these fictional words of Jesus, but they can only do that if Jesus is the author.
8) Helen was a psychologist. Her psychological background was Freudian and she had a great respect for Freud’s work. As I have been saying for over thirty years: without Freud, one would not have A Course in Miracles, as the presentation of the ego thought system is heavily based upon Freud’s remarkable insights, which were second nature to Helen.
9) Helen had a love-hate relationship with Jesus. Of course there is no hate in the Course in terms of Jesus, but no one can mistake his loving and non-judgmental presence throughout.
I do believe it is a violation of hers and Bill’s privacy to read the Urtext (or any other version) when she only sanctioned the Foundation’s publication. Helen and Bill wanted me to read it, but it is like reading someone’s private diaries. Why would you want to do that, especially when asked not to, unless you are looking for conflict and guilt? Recall these words from the introduction to the clarification of terms:
Returning to this important point, there is a prominent idea that what Helen took down are Jesus’ literal words, and are therefore sacred and should never have been altered. This is as patently absurd as the lady who wrote to me after the second (and numbered) edition was published, accusing me of changing Jesus’ course by adding numbers to it. Helen did not think that way. A lot of what she heard at the beginning was just wrong, and she of course knew that. Again, I had many personal experiences with Helen of her writing down messages she said were from Jesus. This, by the way, occurred during the same time period when she was writing down the pamphlets, which are certainly pure in their teaching. Inaccuracies were frequently the result when she was involved with specifics. Here are some additional examples.
Once again, the personal and private material in the Urtext does not belong in any published version. Most writers destroy all the earlier versions when they finish a manuscript. I do that when I complete a book and it is published. In reading the Urtext, students of A Course in Miracles are not going to find “Jesus’ authentic words,” but the writings of a woman struggling (at first) with the scribal process, and thus are reading what was never meant to be read. Now, if you do read it, I am not saying Helen will strike you dead with a thunderbolt, or that it is sinful, but you should at least ask yourself why you are doing so. As Jesus emphasizes throughout his course: purpose is everything; we need to ask only one question of anything: What is it for? I can guarantee you one thing, however: the Urtext will not enhance your understanding of the Course. If anything, it will confuse you because, as I have indicated, you will come across specific things that were not meant to be read by the public and will seem to contradict what the Course itself teaches, not to mention its use of words and terms that suggest the opposite of what the Course’s teachings are.
The Making of 'A Course in Miracles'. A Catholic priest recounts the mysterious spiritual journey of 'A Course in Miracles' scribe Helen Schucman. Journalist Randall Sullivan met Father Benedict Groeschel, a Catholic priest and popular speaker, while Sullivan was investigating claims of miraculous occurences in America and abroad.
In this excerpt, Father Groeschel discusses Helen Schucman, who "scribed" the bestselling spiritual work "A Course in Miracles.". Reprinted from The Miracle Detective: An Investigation of Holy Visions with permission of Grove/Atlantic.
He had been a graduate student in psychology at Columbia University during the late 1960s when one of his professors, a woman named Helen Schucman, had written-"which is not to say authored"-A Course in Miracles.
Groeschel continued to try to "open the doors of the Church" to Schucman, but his influence was subverted by her husband. William Thetford, also a Columbia professor, was a mysterious character, and "probably the most sinister person I ever met," the priest recalled.
A Course in Miracles (ACIM) was "scribed" by Schucman between 1965 and 1972 through a process of inner dictation. She experienced the process as one of a distinct and clear dictation from an inner voice, which earlier had identified itself to her as Jesus. Her scribing of A Course in Miracles began with these words: "This is a course in miracles. Please take notes."
Following the transcription and editing, Schucman began to reduce the level of her direct involvement in the ACIM related effort and was never as heavily involved with teaching or popularizing the material as were its editors, Bill Thetford and Kenneth Wapnick. Helen Schucman, painted by Brian Whelan.
^ The 1st edition of A Course in Miracles was published in 1975 as a 4-volume set of books. Vol. 1 contains Chapters 1-14 of the "Text" section of the Course, Vol. 2 contains Chapters 15-30 of the "Text" section of the Course, Vol. 3 contains the "Workbook" section of the Course, and Vol. 4 contains the "Teacher's Manual" section of the Course. The Foundation for Parasensory Investigation - founded and run by Judith Skutch and her second husband Robert E. Skutch - was the publisher of the 1st edition of the Course, and also held the 1975 Copyright to the work. The Freeperson Press, a small privately owned printing/publishing company located at 325 Ninth Street in San Francisco, California, did the actual printing and binding of the 1st edition of the Course. The edition published by the Foundation for Inner Peace claims that the course "was published in three volumes in June 1976". The 1st edition of the Course consisted, in total, of 300 sets of the 4-volume Course. These 300 sets of the 4-volume Course were printed and bound - over a period of several months in 1975 - by the Freeperson Press. Eleanor Camp Criswell, owner/manager of the Freeperson Press, was in charge of the printing and binding of the 1st edition of the Course. Consequently, it has become customary to refer to the 1st edition of the Course either as the "Criswell edition" or the "Freeperson Press edition". Criswell only printed 100 sets of the 4-volume Course at a time - as they were needed for sale and distribution - so the 1st edition of the Course is actually three separate "printings" of the books. The "first printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the first 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in yellow covers. The "second printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the next 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in white covers. The "third printing" of the "1st edition," consisting of the final 100 4-volume sets of the Course printed by Criswell, were bound in blue covers. By February 1976, all 300 4-volume sets of the "Criswell edition" of the Course had been sold and/or distributed. Judith (born Judith M. Rothstein on April 12, 1931) married Robert Edward Skutch (born July 19, 1925) in 1966 (it was Judith's second marriage), but they divorced (on friendly terms) in 1980. Later in the 1980s, Judith Skutch married William Wallace "Whit" Whitson (December 3, 1926 - February 8, 2018) and became known as Judith Skutch Whitson. Eleanor Camp Criswell (born May 12, 1938) became known as Eleanor Criswell Hanna [Wikidata] after her marriage to philosopher Thomas Louis Hanna (Nov. 21, 1928 - July 29, 1990) on June 25, 1974. Thomas L. Hanna was the originator of Hanna Somatics, aka Hanna Somatic Education. In 1975 Thomas and Eleanor co-founded the Novato Institute for Somatic Research and Training, located at Novato, California.
It was written by her longtime friend, Kenneth Wapnick.
Schucman had a brother, Adolph Cohn, who was almost 12 years her senior. Though her parents were both half-Jewish, they were non-observant.
However, it was the family housekeeper, Idabel, a Baptist, who had the deepest religious influence on Schucman while she was growing up. In 1921, when she was 12, Schucman visited Lourdes, France, where she had a spiritual experience, and in 1922 she was baptized as a Baptist. Later in life, she considered herself an atheist.
Schucman, Helen (June 1972). The Retarded Child from Birth to Five: A Multidisciplinary Program for the Child and Family. John Day Co. ISBN 978-0-381-98127-3. OCLC 303564.
The reason is simple: We as a race do not trust Helen Schucman as much as we trust Jesus Christ. You may think it should not matter to us where the Course came from, that it should carry weight based strictly on the merit of its words. Yet even so I suspect that if you truly imagine that its specific words came from Jesus, you will find yourself feeling differently about the Course. In evaluating words and ideas, we humans always consider the source.
The words of the Course claim that they in some sense come from the individual known as Jesus of Nazareth.
A legal suit has been filed by Penguin, the new publishers of the Course, against Endeavor Academy in Wisconsin. While this suit is about copyright infringement, Endeavor is seeking to make the central issue the authorship of A Course in Miracles. It claims that since Jesus of Nazareth authored the Course, it is not copyrightable.
No one debates this one. Ken and Gloria Wapnick express the obvious fact in their book, The Most Commonly Asked Questions About ACIM:
The great thing about this question is that it is not so hard to answer. Clear answers are communicated in the Course itself. And extremely clear answers are communicated in the personal guidance to Helen and Bill which did not make it into the Course. Much of this guidance, as many Course students know, was published in Ken Wapnick’s Absence from Felicity.
Some very intelligent people have held this latter view. I recall reading Ken Wilber, the great transpersonal theorist, flatly state that Jesus did not author the Course. He basically chalked the Course up to Helen’s “genius.” I also recall reading John White (author in the fields of consciousness research and higher development), who had initially offered to publish the Course, say that it was impossible for Jesus to author a book since he no longer existed as a personal entity. And then there is Ken Wapnick, the most respected interpreter of the Course, whose published works have apparently been consulted by Penguin’s lawyers in forming their statement. Ken’s stance is that Helen’s mind made contact with the formless, transcendental mind of Jesus, and that his abstract love then took the shape of Helen’s familiar forms, as water takes the shape of a glass. As a result, Jesus was responsible for the content, Helen for the form.
A Course in Miracles was “scribed” by Dr. Helen Schucman through a process of inner dictation that she identified as coming from Jesus. A clinical and research psychologist and tenured Associate Professor of Medical Psychology, she was assisted by Dr. William Thetford, her department head, who was also a tenured Professor of Medical Psychology at the Medical Center where they both worked.
The Workbook for Students consists of 365 lessons, an exercise for each day of the year. This one-year training program begins the process of changing the student’s mind and perception, though it is not intended to bring one’s learning to completion. As stated in the Preface to the Course, “At the end, the reader is left in the hands of his or her own Internal Teacher, Who will direct all subsequent learning as He sees fit.” (Pre: ix-x) You can study the Workbook’s daily lessons in both text and audio in English; also available as text in Dutch , French, German, Italian , Portuguese and Spanish.
A Course in Miracles, therefore, is a universal spiritual teaching, not a religion. The Text presents the theory of the Course and has built into its study the development of the experience of forgiveness that is the Course’s goal for the student.
Consequently, even though the language of the Course is that of traditional Christianity, it expresses a non-sectarian, non-denominational spirituality.
Helen Schucman, Ph.D., was a most unlikely person to scribe A Course in Miracles, as was William Thetford, Ph.D., the person to assist her. In reality, in the Psychology Department of Presbyterian Hospital in New York which Dr. Thetford headed and where they both worked, Helen was his assistant. Both also held positions at Columbia University’s ...
An exclusive presentation and behind-the-scenes story of how a profound spiritual thought system was channeled through two noted psychologists at a prestigious Eastern University. Considered one of the miracles of the Century, A Course in Miracles is now a phenomenal, quiet bestseller worldwide.
Bill, who was 14 years younger than Helen , was an inherent optimist who, despite the formidable obstacles he faced, maintained a persistent underlying belief that there was a real way out of any difficult situation, and with perseverance one could always find it.
Even Ken Wapnick, who believes that Helen supplied the form of the Course, admits that Helen’s experience was different: “Helen’s experience, as we have seen, was that Jesus used her particular talents and abilities” (p. 482, italics mine). Yet this was not only Helen’s experience, it was what the words she heard claimed. And it was a specific application of the overall thought system she heard. This, then, will be our ninth conclusion:
(1) The words Helen heard in some sense come from the individual known as Jesus of Nazareth. (2) Jesus, though awakened, has remained with us in a personal way and thus is able to do things within time and space, such as author a book. (3) He has remained with us as some kind of distinct identity, who is one with all other (physical and non-physical) saviors, yet is still in some way distinct from them and is their leader. (4) He carefully chose the specific English words of the Course, which is reflected in the acute awareness of words that he displays in the Course. (5) In the case of the puns he makes, the specific content expressed depends on the multiple meanings of particular English words, suggesting that he formulated both the content and the words together.
Jesus is telling Helen and Bill (p. 265) that they wasted a lot of time that day and that he would have liked to use the time to correct some past notes. He then says, “A major point of clarification is necessary in connection with the phrase ‘replacing hatred (or fear) with love.'” The notes then leave off and pick up later, with Jesus again speaking:
In Part I, I dealt with the role of Jesus. I settled on five conclusions which will be reviewed near the end of this article. Now, in Part II, I will turn to seven conclusions about the roles of Helen and Bill. At the end I will put all twelve conclusions together into a total picture and discuss the implications of that picture.
For instance, Helen was once told that of the two parts of a message she received, “The second part was put in by you, because you didn’t like the first ” (p. 237). There is a saving grace here, however. Jesus is apparently aware of Helen inserting her words in place of his.
In order to reach her, Jesus intentionally shaped his content into a “language” familiar to Helen. That explains why the Course uses so many of Helen’s forms (English language, Christian symbology, psychodynamics, curricular format, and Shakespearean blank verse).
Helen’s willingness not only affected the accuracy of the words she heard , it also affected the quality or level of thought that was able to come through her.