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The Seventh Commandment

The seventh commandment reads: “You shall not steal.” This is what it says in most Bibles. In the Bible, “The Good News”, it says “Do not deprive anyone of his freedom and his possessions.”

Again we see that we shouldn’t take the Bible literally, but according to its meaning. If we can learn to understand the meaning, then we also know which passages of the Bible correspond to the eternal truth and which don’t. We can understand the word of the Bible according to its meaning only when we ourselves align with God by fulfilling the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount step by step. Everything else is opinion. And it will remain opinion and will not be the truth as long as we ourselves don’t strive for the truth. In other words: What we hear from or read into a statement, what we think or speak, will be the truth only when it is filled with our actualization of the commandments of God.

And so, what is the meaning of the seventh commandment “You shall not steal”?

Stealing means that we take something from our neighbour; we steal something from him. We steal money from our neighbour here or there; we steal his goods and possessions. But we also steal time from our neighbour when, for instance, we have unimportant conversations with him. We also interfere in his life when we prevent him from following his own way, by forcing our opinions on him and expecting him to believe what we offer him as our opinion.

Another form of stealing is to take energy from our neighbour by preoccupying ourselves with him – even if it is only in our thoughts – to such an extent that he takes note of us and does for us what we don’t want to do ourselves. If our neighbour can’t go his way because of our influence, if he can’t fulfil his thoughts and his will – if these are negative – then we have tied him to ourselves in order to take energy from him. He is then supposed to do what we want. Christ teaches us about this in His great work of revelation “This Is My Word”*:

“The one who allows his fellow man to lead him by the nose, thus doing what others say although he recognizes that this is not his way, is lived and passes by his own actual earthly existence. He does not use the days; he is used by those to whom he is servile and therefore does not know his path over this earth as man.

The one who binds his fellow man by forcing his will upon him can be compared to a vampire who sucks the energy from his fellow man. He does not know himself and at the same time ties himself to his victim – and vice versa, the victim who lets himself be drained also ties himself to him. Both will be brought together again, in one of their lives, either in earthly garment or as souls in the spheres beyond – and this, so often and so long, until the one has forgiven the other.”

Why is it that every thought is so decisive? Why is it that I can steal energy from my neighbour – soul and body energy – through my thoughts? After all, my neighbour doesn’t know my thoughts.

Mostly we aren’t aware enough of the fact that thoughts are powers and that we can become indebted to our neighbour simply through our thoughts. We can steal our neighbour’s soul and body energy by sending him certain sinful thoughts, for instance, desires. If our neighbour has similar aspects of sin in his soul – perhaps latent – as the ones we have emitted to him in our thoughts, then this potential starts to vibrate in him; it becomes active. It rises up in his world of feelings and thoughts. By emitting towards him in thoughts, we have caused this reaction in him; we have infected him with our thinking, wanting and desiring.

More grows out of this, because it is possible that our neighbour, who has become a victim of our thoughts, fulfils an unlawful desire for himself, because we have emitted our thoughts towards him for so long that something negative was awakened and came alive in him, causing him to act sinfully. What happened? We affected his soul and body energy, through which body and soul became weaker, since the negativity broke out too soon in him. If our neighbour cannot deal with these desires and sins, which are, in turn, burdens for him, then we are also a part of this.

An example of this: A man sees a woman. The sensation comes up in him that he wants to get to know her better; he wants to come into contact with her. The woman doesn’t think about him. But he thinks about her again and again. The effect can be that she becomes aware of him and starts thinking about him. Maybe even the same desires form in her that are active in him towards her. And so, through his initiative, he has set into motion a whirl of thoughts in her, perhaps even to the point of desiring him.

But if a desire breaks out in the woman, because she has something similar in her that isn’t directed towards the sender, but towards another man to whom the woman now emits, then the man who awakened this sending-potential in her shares in the sins initiated in the woman. He likewise has a share of the sins of the man whom she emitted towards, in whom perhaps the same or similar desire was stimulated. And so, the thoughts went from the sender, the man, to the woman; some things were triggered in the woman; thoughts then went from the woman to another man, in whom some things, in turn, became active. Perhaps this man now thinks about another woman or because of the tension does something negative, maybe even violent. Who is now to blame for the sinful deed of this man?

And so, we see how a chain of guilt can develop, to which every individual who contributed to it is bound with his share.

Much suffering can be woven into such a guilt-complex. One of the participants may be unfaithful to his partner; another may not reach his life’s goal anymore; yet another falls into self-pity and depression and so on.

In our example, the starting point of all this trouble was the man who emitted. Who bears the greater guilt? He or the others who were stimulated by him? He has to bear the greatest guilt, because he stole from his neighbour. He caused the lack of energy in the woman towards whom he had emitted his thoughts, so that these causes were awakened too early in her.

Even if these causes lie in the soul of our neighbour, we don’t have the right to activate them through our thoughts, through our desires. This is why thoughts are very dangerous and why we can steal from our neighbour through our thoughts.

If we aren’t aware of these correlations, if we don’t know about a sending-potential that can trigger a lot of thoughts in our neighbour, we are convinced that we haven’t violated the seventh commandment “You shall not steal”. We have never stolen money or taken our neighbour’s goods and possessions, and so we think we are faultless in regards to the seventh commandment.

Therefore, let’s ask ourselves if we are faultless in our thoughts? We could also try to recognize ourselves even more, by asking ourselves: From whom have we taken energy by sending thoughts towards them? Whom have we influenced through our desires and wants, through our emitting towards them, that is, whom have we had an effect on, in order to gain something for ourselves?

One would think that our intentions – for ourselves as well as for our neighbour – are more visible, that is, recognizable, in our words and actions than in our feelings, sensations and thoughts. But here, too, care is called for, because appearances often deceive.

If we look into the true motives of our words and actions, then we may discover that we have acted in an underhanded way and have thus stolen from our neighbour. Perhaps we have, for instance, intentionally given our neighbour a present in order to receive a bigger present. Or we have flattered him, we have buttered him up, in order to get him in the right mood, so that he will do what we want in our thoughts. Flatterers, yes-men and hypocrites always want something for themselves and thus steal from their neighbour.

Let’s look into this world. There is a fight for the energy – for example, the money – of our neighbour. A correct trade cycle is based on the principle of “giving and receiving”. If this cycle is in balance, then we receive as much as we have given selflessly. The “being for and with one another” of a true Christian community life is based on this; and the result is the good for all, the common good.

The principle of “giving and receiving” is misused not only now and then in the world of commerce. Just an example: If prices are set too high, then this is stealing from our neighbour. Wherever one looks there is inequality. Generally, more is taken than given. And through this, the world will tip over someday.

It is similar in nature. Mother Earth is being exploited. For thousands of years, we have taken her energies – and we haven’t given her much more than poison. This is why even our own food is partly poisoned; and this is why we, too, will poison ourselves little by little. The fruits are becoming visible, the effects of what we have caused. This is the way the law of sowing and reaping works.

Where do the many diseases come from? They don’t only come from impure food, from bad, polluted water, but also from what we have sown, which is made up of countess negative, unlawful, selfish and egoistic feelings, sensations, thoughts, words and deeds. The water, the bad food, is merely the product we take in, which then stimulates the body – already weakened by the law of sowing and reaping – to become ill, so that we finally fall ill.

It is obvious that especially the so-called Christians in the western, highly-civilized, high-tech, capitalistic, successful world have ground the seventh commandment under their feet. We are all now starting to feel the devastating consequences.

Here, too, we see again the chain of causes. The one who, for instance, produces poison is also to blame for the damage and misery in the nature kingdoms and that people become ill from the poison and then also emit the corresponding negative thoughts through the illness that may have broken out too soon. This negative thought- and sending-potential stimulates, in turn, more people to negative thoughts and actions. And so, the chain of causes can grow longer and longer. The person who produces the poison is the main one to blame for this chain of causes, but each one who is part of it because of what he did or let happen bears part of the guilt – even through indifference in the face of an obviously deplorable state of affairs.

“You shall not steal” – if we take the words alone, we grasp little of what lies in them. In order to grasp the meaning – which alone makes the letter come alive – more and more every day, we Original Christians have taken as a task to fulfil the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount step by step. And so, we are striving for the truth, in order to live the truth more and more and to carry truthfulness into the world, the justice towards our neighbour and also towards nature. Then we will also recognize the truth in the Bible.

* “This Is My Word. A and W. The Gospel of Jesus. The Christ-Revelation which the world does not know.” Würzburg, 1992, page 332.

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