A Course in Miracles is a set of self-study materials published by the Foundation for Inner Peace. The book’s content is metaphysical, and explains forgiveness as placed on daily life. Curiously, nowhere does the book have an author (and it’s so listed lacking any author’s name by the U.S. Library of Congress). However, the writing was compiled by Helen Schucman (deceased) and William Thetford; Schucman has related that the book’s material is dependant on communications to her from an “inner voice” she claimed was Jesus. The first version of the book was published in 1976, with a revised edition published in 1996. Part of the content is a teaching manual, and students workbook. Since the first edition, the book has sold several million copies, with translations into nearly two-dozen languages.
The book’s origins may be traced back once again to early 1970s; Helen Schucman first experiences with the “inner voice” resulted in her then supervisor, William Thetford, to make contact with Hugh Cayce at the Association for Research and Enlightenment. Subsequently, an introduction to Kenneth Wapnick (later the book’s editor) occurred. During the time of the introduction, Wapnick was clinical psychologist. After meeting, Schucman and Wapnik spent over per year editing and revising the material ucem em portugues. Another introduction, now of Schucman, Wapnik, and Thetford to Robert Skutch and Judith Skutch Whitson, of the Foundation for Inner Peace. The very first printings of the book for distribution were in 1975. Ever since then, copyright litigation by the Foundation for Inner Peace, and Penguin Books, has established that this content of the first edition is in people domain.
A Course in Miracles is a teaching device; the course has 3 books, a 622-page text, a 478-page student workbook, and an 88-page teachers manual. The materials may be studied in the order chosen by readers. The content of A Course in Miracles addresses both the theoretical and the practical, although application of the book’s material is emphasized. The text is mainly theoretical, and is a basis for the workbook’s lessons, which are practical applications. The workbook has 365 lessons, one for every single day of the entire year, though they don’t need to be done at a speed of one lesson per day. Perhaps most just like the workbooks which are familiar to the average reader from previous experience, you’re asked to utilize the material as directed. However, in a departure from the “normal”, the reader isn’t required to think what is in the workbook, as well as accept it. Neither the workbook nor the Course in Miracles is meant to complete the reader’s learning; simply, the materials really are a start.
A Course in Miracles distinguishes between knowledge and perception; truth is unalterable and eternal, while perception is the world of time, change, and interpretation. The planet of perception reinforces the dominant ideas inside our minds, and keeps us separate from the facts, and separate from God. Perception is restricted by the body’s limitations in the physical world, thus limiting awareness. Much of the knowledge of the world reinforces the ego, and the individual’s separation from God. But, by accepting the vision of Christ, and the voice of the Holy Spirit, one learns forgiveness, both for oneself and others.
Thus, A Course in Miracles helps the reader find a way to God through undoing guilt, by both forgiving oneself and others. So, healing occurs, and happiness and peace are found.
