Gentle Dominion Within

Neville's Inner Vision

Within your consciousness, the King represents the I AM—your unconditioned awareness. Absalom, the 'young man', is a vivid impulse or habit you have treated as a son of your heart, cherished and dangerous. When the King commands, 'Deal gently for my sake with the young man,' you are instructing your entire state of being to handle the impulse with mercy, not with vengeance. Joab and Abishai and Ittai are the faculties that draw near—your reason, your will, and your feeling—receiving the command and executing gentleness. The people hearing the decree symbolize the outer life declaring: your inner decision has become your outward action. The battle within culminates not in annihilation of Absalom but in gentle restraint—giving room for the impulse to be transformed rather than eliminated. If you imagine granting mercy to the inner son, you awaken the consciousness that mercy is your essential nature. The act of 'dealing gently' becomes a practice of peace, allowing reconciliation between conflicting parts of self and restoring harmony to your inner family.