Mrs. Eddy has said very definitely in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p.285), "The belief that a material body is man is a false conception of man." Why then do so many of us look to our bodies to tell us about man? Christian Science teaches that a material body is not a reality. Matter can tell us nothing: it has no voice, no intelligence. Matter is simply the seeming manifestation of wrong thinking. It is the carnal mind's view of man; the false belief that he is a creator; that he has a material body which may present many of the infirmities of his so-called mortal parents and ancestors; and that, therefore, he has a fleshly inheritance.
Our individuality, or true selfhood, however, is not material, but is a reflection, or emanation, of Him who is Truth, Love, and Life. "That which is born of the Spirit is spirit," Jesus said. There being nothing sickly or sinful in Spirit, we should refuse to accept as real the erroneous claims attached to the material semblance, or body, called a sick and sinful mortal. Our God-created individuality is incapable of discord or dissolution; and nothing can enter into it "that defileth, ... or maketh a lie." Accepting God as our Father, we can claim an inheritance free from corruption, undefiled by any of the false beliefs usually associated with the thought of a sickly or a sinful heritage, because all we have really inherited is divine and immutable.
Considering the Way-shower, we realize that, so far as the material senses could tell, Jesus' bodily or material appearance was like that of other men. But he always had perfect control over his human personality, because he knew that in his true individuality, born of the Father, he had never inherited anything sinful or imperfect, and that he could not be held in bondage to any materialistic belief. The constant realization of his true selfhood enabled Christ Jesus to see the divine selfhood of other, thereby healing them their diseases, discomforts, and disabilities. This scientific view of himself and of others, utterly opposed to that of the carnal mind, enabled the Master completely to triumph over the flesh, when he rose above the apprehension of his followers at the time of his ascension.
