The Coming of Seth

 Jane Roberts (1929-1984) 

The Coming of Seth is the new title that was selected for a 1976 edition of How to Develop Your ESP Power (1966), the first nonfiction book by Jane Roberts.  Her many later books included The Seth Material (1970), Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity of the Soul (1972) and Adventures in Consciousness: An Introduction to Aspect Psychology (1975).  In recent years, transcripts of the first 510 sessions dictated by Seth have been published in a series of nine volumes entitled The Early Sessions.

In the introduction for The Coming of Seth, Jane explained about her first 'Seth' book:
 

. . . it was based on a series of experiments I devised as a result of my first sudden involuntary out-of-body experience.  Here in these chapters I wrote the day-by-day story of those initial experiments that led to the coming of Seth.  Each chapter contains excerpts from those early sessions.

 
Jane commented about the Ouija Board in Chapter 1:
 

The 'Ouija' board is, among other things, a method of reaching and communicating with this personal subconscious, this inner self that is so important to your inner survival. The personal subconscious knows more about you than you do.

 

 

 

In 1963 after two unsuccessful attempts to use the board, Jane and her husband Robert F. Butts Jr. began to get messages that they attributed to a variety of different personalities.  Jane referred to one personality as 'Frank Withers,' representing an Elmira, New York English teacher, Frank Watts, whose identity was apparently confirmed by an acquaintance.

Jane wrote that after several sessions, this personality "was replaced by the Seth personality."  A message was spelled out on the Ouija Board: “I prefer not to be called Frank Watts.  That personality was rather colorless.”  The communication continued with the couple’s questions in italics —

 

(“What would you prefer to be called?”)

To God all names are his name.

(“But we still need some kind of name or title we can use in talking to you.”)

You may call me whatever you choose.  I call myself Seth.  It fits the me of me, the personality most clearly approximating the whole self I am, or am trying to be.  Joseph is your whole self more or less, the image of the sum of your various personalities in the past and in the future.

 

Thus, Butts became ‘Joseph’ to Seth while the name selected for Jane was ‘Ruburt.'

How to Develop Your ESP Power upon publication attracted a comparatively small readership in relation to following Seth books.

 

There were few reviews for the book, but I was cautioned in some of them against leading my readers astray by encouraging experimentation with the "Ouija" board—which, some said, could lead to psychotic troubles at best, or possession by evil spirits at worst.  And here again I maintain, ten years later, that evil spirits just don't exist in those terms; only the "evil" of superstitious fears, ignorance and dogmas that teach people to fear what they don't understand; the same kind of dogmas that lead people into fanaticism rather than tolerance, fear rather than courage, dependance rather than self-reliance.

 

The first version of Jane's next book "on dreams and out-of-body experiences" mentioned Seth "almost as a footnote."  Jane recalled, "Luckily the editor I sent the book to saw what I was doing and asked for a manuscript about Seth."  This book developed into The Seth Material.  I wonder to what extent Jane might have reflected about the role played by the subconscious mind of the insightful editor who set her on her future course devoted to her progress with 'Seth.'

In her first book about Seth retitled The Coming of Seth, Jane described her progress during the early sessions.

 

From our third "Ouija" board session on, I began to anticipate words, phrases, then complete sentences.  I would know in whole or part what the board would reply to Robert's questions.  I waited, somewhat reluctantly, while the pointer spelled out its replies, but I didn't trust my inner answers either.  I suspected at the time that my personal subconscious was having a good time at my conscious expense.

As sessions continued, I became progressively uneasy.  I began to pick up whole paragraphs before the pointer had completed one sentence.  At the same time, I became annoyed with the slow board process.  Robert had to pause, write down the questions he was going to ask, return his hands with mine to the pointer while the answer was spelled out, then pause again to write down the reply.  This took considerable time.

Though the pointer spelled out the same message that I received mentally, I still distrusted the inner message on the one hand, and felt impelled to speak it aloud on the other.  I did not hear a voice.  Whole sentences simply sprang into my mind. seemingly from nowhere, but the words were not my own.  My reluctance was obvious.  Finally Robert asked the board: "Seth, why is Jane rather reserved about our contacts with you?  I can tell that at times she isn't too enthusiastic."

Through the board Seth replied: "She is concerned because she receives my messages before they are spelled out.  This would make you cautious, too."


By our own eighth session, I was apparently convinced, or my ego was convinced, that greater freedom could be allowed.  In the middle of this session I suddenly shoved the "Ouija" board aside, stood up, and began to dictate.  My voice at the time was perfectly normal, though since then definite voice changes have shown themselves.  The words I spoke, however, were definitely not my own.

From the ninth session to the thirteenth, we used the board only to spell out the first messages, which I could not receive mentally for a while.  Almost instantly this allowed us greater speed of communication, but at the beginning of each sitting I still felt a momentary nervousness at the thought of "letting go."  Now I am hardly ever bothered by such feelings.

Almost immediately we realized that I was in a light trance during this dictation.  The method of delivery can be called automatic speech or voice communication.  My own conscious thoughts recede, along with my consciousness of my surroundings.  There is nothing compulsive about this, however.  At any time it is possible for me to return to normal consciousness.  No invasion is involved.

By the fourteenth session we no longer used the board even for these first messages.  Since Seth suggested it, sessions have been held on certain designated evenings, twice a week.  For the first year I paced the room constantly while dictating, with my eyes wide open, but without any real consciousness of my physical surroundings.  Now I speak sitting down, with my eyes closed, and with no real consciousness of my environment at all.


Psychologists often call personalities like Seth secondary personalities.  Professional mediums call them controls.  The designation given to such personalities does not change the nature of the personalities themselves, and does not aid us in understanding them.  Seth says that he is not a control, as the word is generally used.  He also insists that he is not a secondary personality.  There is no invasion in our relationship.  I do not feel controlled by someone else.  My consent is necessary at all times.  Sometimes I do feel as if my self has somehow expanded.

 

Jane Roberts continued to chronicle her journey with Seth in her next book The Seth Material and later books.

 

 Jane Roberts with 'Seth Material' notebooks circa 1970.

In The Seth Material, Jane commented about testing conducted by 'Dr. Instream' (a name representing Dr. George N. Estabrooks) as well as 'our own envelope tests' where Jane, entranced, would deliver impressions about the sealed contents.

 

All in all our own tests proved invaluable, not only as a part of my training and as a means of increasing my self-confidence, but also in preparing me for some other out-of-body-experiences that would take place during later Seth sessions.  The tests, and Seth's comments, also gave us insights into the nature of inner perception that literally could not have been achieved in any other way.

As Seth varied the trance depths, I became aware of two lines of consciousness, his and my own, and to understand at least to some degree when my own personal associations were an aid and when they were a detriment.  In a very deep trance, the inner processes are hidden even from the medium.  With most mediums the mechanics are so automatic that little can be learned about the inner psychological actions involved in such work.  Seth maintained that our situation would work to our advantage in this respect.

In the data he would often differentiate between his impressions and any of mine that had slipped in, connect mine to their source in personal associations, and tell us whether or not they were legitimate.  I am seldom so "blacked out" as to feel as if I were sleeping.  Usually I know what is going on, although I may almost instantly forget what has happened.  On occasion Seth and I can take turns talking so that I can go in and out of trance in seconds.  Sometimes it seems I merge with Seth, feeling his emotions and reactions completely, rather than my own.  In this case the Jane-self is far in the background, dozing but dimly conscious.  Other times, though less seldom, I am in the foreground and Seth advises me as to what to say.

Our own tests gave me a standard against which to measure my performance and Seth's, providing an immediate check of accuracy and teaching me to sharpen my subjective focus to go from the general to the specific.  All of this training was important as far as my reception of the Seth Material itself was concerned.  Seth has often spoken about the necessary distortions that must occur in any such communications, and he is most concerned that the material be as little contaminated by distortions as possible.  He discusses this thoroughly in later sessions.

 

Jane reported that Seth has used several analogies to explain reincarnational experiences.

 

On page 3,600 of our own sessions I find this: "The various reincarnational selves can be superficially regarded as portions of a crossword puzzle, for they are all portions of the whole, and yet they exist separately."

In the 256th session he said, "Because you are obsessed with the idea of past, present, and future, you are forced to think of reincarnations as strung out one before the other.  Indeed we speak of past lives because you are used to the time sequence concept.  What you have instead is something like the developments narrated in The Three Faces of Eve.  You have dominant egos, all a part of an inner identity, dominant in various existences.  But the separate existences exist simultaneously.  Only the egos involved make the time distinction.  145 B.C., A.D. 145, a thousand years in your past, and a thousand years in your future—all exist now."

 

This statement was heard during the 406th Seth session in April 1968:

 

"I am the Seth that I say that I am, but I am also more.  The Seth personality that is part of me is the portion that can most clearly communicate with you.  Do you follow me?"
 

"The Seth portion of me has been intimately connected with you both, and so, in that respect, have I.  This is closely related to the definition of a personality energy essence, from which, of course, all personalities spring."

 

The following declaration was made during a session in June.

 

"We taught man to speak before the tongue knew syllables.  We adopt whatever personality characteristics seem pertinent, for in our own reality we have a bank of complete inner selves, and we are all Seth.  We attempt to translate realities into terms that you can comprehend.  We change our face and form, but we are always the one.  Many of us have not been born in flesh, as I have not been.  In one way we have seeded ourselves through endless universes . . ."

 

The Seth Material also presented "one of the thumbnail passages that explain Seth's concept of God" —

 

"He is not human in your terms, though he passed through human stages; and here the Buddhist myth comes closest to approximating reality.  He is not one individual, but an energy gestalt.

"If you remember what I said about the way in which the universe expands, that it has nothing to do with space, then you may perhaps dimly perceive the existence of a psychic pyramid of interrelated, ever-expanding consciousness that creates, simultaneously and instantaneously, universes and individuals that are given—through the gifts of personal perspective—duration, psychic comprehension, intelligence, and eternal validity . . ."

 

'Nonbeing' is another topic:

 

"It is a state, not of nothingness, but a state in which probabilities and possibilities are known and anticipated but blocked from expression.

"Dimly, through what you would call history, hardly remembered, there was such a state.  It was a state of agony in which the powers of creativity and existence were known, but the ways to produce them were not known.

"This is the lesson that All That Is had to learn, and that could not be taught.  This is the agony from which creativity originally was drawn, and its reflection is still seen."


"All portions of All That Is are constantly changing, enfolding and unfolding.  All That Is, seeking to know Itself, constantly creates new versions of Itself.  For this seeking Itself is a creative activity and the core of all action."

 

The 'Seth Material' that is now available encompasses 20 transcript volumes of 'Early Sessions,' 'Early Class Sessions' and 'Personal Sessions'; and ten 'Seth Books' (dictated by Seth).
 
Update: Also see "Case Profile: Jane Roberts - The 'Channel' for 'Seth'"