The lecture “The Spirit of Within” delivered by Neville Goddard on April 25, 1969, reinterprets biblical figures as personifications of inner states of consciousness rather than historical individuals. He explains that characters like Abraham, Satan, and Jesus represent psychological or spiritual conditions, and that true scripture must be read allegorically to unlock divine revelations about the self. Goddard emphasizes the creative power of imagination, illustrating how inner judgments can manifest outward circumstances. He portrays the human skull as a “hollowed foundation stone” in which the Christ within is buried and destined to awaken in a first-person spiritual experience. Supported by scriptural citations and student anecdotes, the lecture shows how grace and truth emerge from within. In closing, he provides a practical exercise: conceive a vivid inner scene that implies the fulfillment of your desire, live it until it feels real, then release it in faith. This process, he asserts, demonstrates the universal law of assumption, whereby imagination becomes reality. He also cautions against external religious idols, urging listeners to discover their divine self through the “I AM” of imagination.
When reading the Bible always bear in mind that the persons Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Jesus, Peter, Paul, (or any name appearing there) are states of consciousness. The names only identify the states represented. If you see the characters as persons, you misunderstand scripture, for the names are simply personifications of eternal states which will be revealed to you, mortal man, in a series of divine revelations.
Satan, for instance, personifies the state of complete unbelief. In the state of Satan you cannot accept a thing as real unless you can touch it or see it. Blake tells us: “Satan believes that sin is displeasing to God. He ought to know that nothing displeases God but unbelief and eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The Combat of Good and Evil is eating of the Tree of Knowledge. The Combat of Truth and Error is Eating of the Tree of Life. These are not only Universal, but Particular. Each are Personified.” Here he speaks of Satan as an eternal state into which anyone may fall when a state is denied because it is not in harmony with the outer senses.
But every mystic worthy of the name knows that a true judgement need not conform to the external facts to which it relates. If I say: “Aren’t they beautiful?” and you see nothing, you may not agree. That is because you are not seeing what I am. I may be seeing a dozen red roses in a crystal vase which has been placed on a corner table in my living room. Now, to the degree that I am self-persuaded they are there, their appearance will become a fact. This I know from experience, so I know that a true judgement need not conform to the external facts to which it relates. Satan insists that it must, but truth (called Jesus Christ) tells us that it need not be so.
Tonight we will take the Spirit of truth on a higher level. Personified as a man, Jesus proclaimed himself to be the Spirit of Truth saying: “I came out from the Father and came into the world. Again I am leaving the world and going to the Father.” Knowing the physical background of the man who said these words, this statement did not make sense to those who knew the speaker, and he had nothing to display on the outside to support his claim. The Jerusalem Talmud tells us that if the Messiah is in the world he does not know it until Elijah comes and anoints him. Then he will suddenly appear, for the Jewish expectancy is the sudden appearance of the Messiah.
In the Book of Zechariah this Messiah is called “the corner, or top stone.” “He shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of ‘Grace! Grace to him!” And in the book of John, we read: “The law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” Here we see he is the top stone as well as the foundation stone of which there is no other. Now, a foundation stone is hollow, for it contains the plan of the edifice. There must be a plan, a purpose for a building, so in the hollow foundation stone the documents are laid. This structure is the temple of the Living God, of which you are. His plan of salvation is buried in your skull and you are destined to bring forth this plan, as grace and truth reveal you to be the one and only Jesus Christ.
A lady wrote this week, saying: “A week ago last Monday as I closed my eyes in the silence, I thanked you for once more explaining the law although I already know all about it, when I heard you say, ‘But do you really know it?’ Then I realised that I knew it with my surface mind, but did not really believe it in the depths of my being.
Suddenly a pyramid appeared with the top stone missing. A sphere was above the pyramid, peaked by a crown outlined in a scintillating white light. The sphere began to spin, causing everything to become so brilliant I closed my spiritual eyes to return to this level of my being. Since then I have felt that if my inner eye had been stronger I would have seen a being emerge from that light.” She is right, she would have, but it is not yet time for her to see her true self.
Your wonderful skull is the hollowed out foundation stone where Christ is buried. God and his creative power became you (humanity) that you may become as He is, for He is the consciousness of every child born of woman, and in the fullness of time a being will emerge from that stone to know itself to be the light of the world. In the 3rd chapter of the 1st Epistle of John, we read: “It does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall know him for we shall be like him.” Yes! When God’s plan of salvation unfolds itself in you, you wil1 not only be like him, you will be one with him!
In order to externalise truth (or error) a man is needed to be its agent; therefore, truth is man. Scripture personifies truth, but man, not realising this, sees one unique little man and not God’s plan. Having unfolded His plan of salvation in a man, God uses that man as his agent to say: “I am the way, the truth and the light. No one comes unto the Father but by me. If you knew me you would know my Father also, for I and my Father are one.”
I, the Living Word, came into the world to experience scripture and I cannot return unto him void, but must accomplish that which I purposed and prosper in the thing for which I was sent. The O1d Testament is an adumbration of God’s plan of salvation. Written as the history of Israel, it is experienced spiritually by an individual whose physical origin is known, and the world sees the person, but not the state he is conscious of being. They expect the Messiah to be a being external to themselves, to come out of the nowhere and surprise them. But the Messiah is buried in that hollowed foundation stone which is the skull of Man. He does come suddenly, for when it is his time to awaken, everything said of Jesus Christ in scripture unfolds in you, in a first person singular, present tense experience. Then you tell your friends about your experiences and they smile as they shake their heads, for they know your parents, your weaknesses and your failures, and cannot believe you have fulfilled the Old Testament.
Although I read the statement in the 40th Psalm: “In the volume of the book it is all about me,” I did not know it to be true until the Spirit of truth awakened in me. Now I tell my brothers that I am departing this world and going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God because I know that we are all one. The one God in a diversified state appears as many, but it takes the many to form the one God. “Hear, O Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord is one.”
When you read scripture, always remember that every word has a meaning. The word “Zechariah” means “Jehovah remembers.” In the state of Zechariah you remember your promise to Israel, for the word “Israel” means, “to rule as God.” Remembering, you don’t rule as a little god-like tyrant of the world, but as God Himself! You must forget the concept of Jesus Christ as a little man external to yourself, for it is Christ in you who is your hope of glory. All things are made by him, whether they be good or ill, lovely or unlovely. An artist doesn’t have to create only the beautiful, but can create anything, and so it is with God. You can find him by testing your wonderful human imagination.
I have searched for and found Jesus Christ to be my own wonderful human imagination. I now know that everything in my world was first imagined by me. I may not always remember the imaginal act relative to the unlovely things I have experienced, but I have imagined and watched its fulfillment in my world. I know that although I may not remember the imaginal act, I must have committed it, for I cannot reap that which I have not sown.
In the 2nd chapter of the Book of Jeremiah, the Lord said: “I planted you a pure seed, O Israel. How did you become degenerate?” I will tell you how! By going after foreign gods; by worshipping the gods of astrology, numerology, wealth, or so-called important people. By believing in things on the outside and seeing other causes for the phenomena of your life and not the only cause, who is God, your own wonderful human imagination, whose name is I am! One day you will awaken to discover that you are the one and only God. But you aren’t going to rob anyone, for it takes all your brothers, together, to form the one pyramid, and when this is accomplished the top stone will be put in place.
Now a lady wrote, saying: “This dream disturbs me greatly. In the dream I entered an exquisite jewelry store, [and] picked up many items, among which was a beautiful green gem. Then I left without paying for the articles I took. On this level I would never do such a thing and cannot understand why I would do it there.” My dear, you should be thrilled because you did it. On this level you are eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but you are way beyond this tree, for you are now eating of the Tree of Life by fulfilling the 50th Psalm: “If I were hungry I would not tell you for the world is mine and all within it.” If everything is yours, whose permission do you need to take it? As an incurrent eyewitness, you do not function here save when you open your mortal eyes. In this world of good and evil you would never go to Tiffany’s and walk out without paying for your purchases, but as the Spirit of truth, you are feasting upon the tree of truth and error in the world that is yours. In that world there is no need to ask permission of anyone to take anything you desire.
Man’s real hunger is not for bread alone, but for the Word of God to fulfill itself in him, as Amos was told: “I will send a hunger upon you. It will not be for bread or a thirst for water, but for the hearing of the word of God.” Her hunger was represented by the green stone, green being that which is growing, like the tree of life. My dear, you are blessed for having such a dream.
No one would ever agree with another as to what is right and what is wrong, for we all have different values. What is right to one is wrong to another. We came down into the world of death because we ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and we are told that the only thing that displeases God is the eating of that tree, and unbelief. If you think another is the cause of your misfortune, you are sinning and missing your mark in life. There is only one cause for all of the phenomena of your life, and that is God, whose eternal name is I AM. When you really believe this, you will not deny the harvest you are reaping. It may be unpleasant, but you will know that it couldn’t happen unless you sowed it, so accept your harvest and then plant something lovely in its place. Never deny that one and only cause, which is your own wonderful human imagination!
Scripture teaches no other God, but organised churches have created little icons for people to come and genuflect before in violation of the 2nd commandment: “Make no graven image unto me.” Half of my family are Catholic and have these monstrous looking statues all over their homes. We were raised Protestant, but several of my brothers married Catholics and raised their children in that belief. I don’t argue with them because as far as they are concerned, I am a product of Satan. If I would only go with them on Sunday mornings and do all the little nonsense they do, it would be wonderful as far as they are concerned; but they think I am blaspheming when I tell them that the only Christ erupted in me as my very self, for they know my origin, my father and my mother. They do not know the “I” who was in concealment until Elijah came.
The body you wash and care for on the outside is the Elijah of the Old Testament and the John the Baptist of the New. Coming into the world by assuming a garment of hair, man has made every effort to attain salvation by physical means, like doing violence against its appetite. For seven years I went on a starvation diet of vegetables only and I grew thinner and thinner and weaker and weaker. I was young and virile. I desired everything that a normal man would, yet I went on a diet of celibacy and had nightmares with my suppressions, wondering why they were happening to me when I was trying to be such a holy man. Ab once told me that I was so good, I was good for nothing. That’s John the Baptist, the outer man, who must be restrained and beheaded before Christ can come into the world. This I know from experience, for I certainly didn’t expect him. I went to sleep in my normal manner, not knowing that in the wee hours of the morning He would erupt in me, but he did, for I awoke to find myself in a tomb which was my skull. Then, in 1,260 days, everything said of Jesus Christ unfolded in me in a first person singular, present tense experience, just as told us in the Book of Daniel and confirmed in the Book of Revelation.
Now I, personified truth, stand alone and point the only way to the Father, while Satan (personified error) has the authority of the world behind him. The world has accepted error by worshiping their misinterpretations of scripture which have become the traditions of the church, yet I have awakened and know exactly what has happened to me. I have been on television and radio around the clock with ministers, priests and rabbis who look at me strangely when I quote their own Book for them. When I quoted the words spoken by David in the 2nd Psalm as: “I will tell of the decree of the Lord. He said to me, ‘Thou art my son, today I have begotten thee’, they said: “But that quote belongs to Jesus Christ.” This is true. The statement can be found in the 3rd chapter of Matthew, but did not David, in the Spirit, call Jesus, “My Lord”?
One night in New York City I said to a rabbi: “David called me Father.Is that not the fulfillment of the 89th Psalm? I have found David. He has cried unto me: ‘Thou art my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.’ Therefore am I not the one spoken of in the 20th chapter of Luke as Christ?” With that the rabbi put his hands to his ears to shut out such blasphemy, yet this same truth is found throughout the entire scripture. They called him blasphemous because he said: “I and my Father are one. My Father is he who you call God, but I know my Father and you know not your God.” He never denied his brothers, but knew they were sound asleep and would one day awaken to discover that God is the dreamer in all. At the present time he is dreaming he is you, and when he awakes, you will be God. He actually became as you are, that you may become as He is.
Now, in order to prove that the law works, you must try it. Have a goal. Your goal may be peace of mind, health or marriage. You name it. Knowing your own wonderful human imagination is the one and only cause of your life, conceive a scene which, if true, would imply the fulfillment of your goal. Do not allow yourself to observe the action, but put yourself in the center of the scene and allow your friends to congratulate you on your good fortune. Accept their congratulations without embarrassment. Enter into the spirit of the scene and remain there until it feels real, then drop it in confidence that the imaginal act was performed by God. How do I know this? Because God’s name forever and ever is I am. If at the time of your imagining I had asked you what you were doing, you would have said: “I am imagining.” At that moment you called forth your desire with His name.
Every time you imagine, God is acting and all things are possible to him.
All you need to do now is wait patiently, confident that your desire will externalise itself, and when it does you have found the cause of creation. Then tell your sleeping brothers, who wait patiently for their world to change while they activate its continuance. Nothing happens on the outside! Everything has to be initiated on the inside first. Read the morning paper, turn on the television or radio, and react to what you hear and see, and that reaction is an imaginal act which will cause unlovely experiences to people your world. As you reap your harvest, you may not relate your present experience to what you did, but you had to have done it or you couldn’t be aware of it now, for everything is yourself pushed out, for you and God are one.
When you read scripture in the future, bear in mind that the persons stated there are personifications of states. The word, “Moses”, for instance, is the ancient Egyptian verb meaning “to be born”. And what is to be born? The Living word which will fulfill the written word. The New Testament is the fulfillment of the Old. It’s not the other way around. There could be no New without the Old. The Old Testament tells the story by intimating God’s plan, while the New Testament interprets it by fulfilling it. Man has misunderstood the interpretation and worships states called Moses, Elijah, Jesus, Peter, Paul, and all the others, when you – as an individual – interpret the states within yourself to discover that you are scripture.
He sent me, His word, into the world with the words: “Time to act.” Having looked into the face of infinite love, we embraced, fused and became one protean being. Now God, as infinite might I was hurled out of that assembly and returned to this little garment lying on the bed. I did not know what it was all about, but I have never forgotten the experience. I could no more deny it than I could the simplest act of my senses, yet that happened to me back in 1929. Thirty years later His word, now myself, erupted and I began to fulfill scripture within myself. Now I tell it to those who will listen, knowing that no one comes unto me save my Father calls him. He draws you, one by one, to hear His unfolded Word. Of those who come, some believe and some disbelieve, as indicated through your visions.
Now I am departing this world, not to a restored society like this, but to return to the body of the Risen Lord, knowing myself to be one with the one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one God and Father of all.
Now let us go into the silence.
Neville Goddard’s hermeneutic approach is deeply allegorical, transforming familiar biblical narratives into maps of individual consciousness. By asserting that Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and even Satan are not historical figures but states of mind, he challenges orthodox exegesis and invites his audience to see scripture as an inner drama. This reorientation strips religious texts of their literal trappings, presenting them instead as symbolic blueprints for self-discovery and spiritual awakening.
Central to the lecture is the concept of imagination as the creative force of the universe. Goddard describes the human skull as a hollow foundation stone containing the divine plan of salvation, with Christ within awaiting resurrection in our awareness. This powerful metaphor fuses mysticism with psychology, suggesting that transformative revelation arises from the depths of human imagination rather than external ritual or belief systems.
Practical application underpins his teaching: listeners are encouraged to perform “imaginal acts” by constructing vivid internal scenes that embody their goals. Through sustained feeling and conviction in these scenes, one activates the law of assumption, whereby what is assumed to be true becomes realized in experience. Anecdotes of student visions and scriptural corroborations serve to validate this process, illustrating how inner alignment precipitates external change.
Goddard’s critique of organized religion and worship of external icons underscores a broader theme of self-sovereignty. He decries idolatry of statues and church traditions, insisting that authentic communion with God arises when individuals recognize themselves as the living Word. This radical proposition reframes salvation as a personal, interior event, democratizing spiritual authority and diminishing institutional intermediaries.
Ultimately, “The Spirit of Within” weaves together allegory, mysticism, and pragmatic technique into a coherent metaphysical system. It beckons seekers to reinterpret sacred texts, harness inner imagination, and actualize their divine nature. Through this synthesis, Goddard crafts a transformative path in which scripture, psychology, and the law of assumption converge, promising liberation from external limitations by awakening the Christ within.
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