Embalming the Inner Israel

Neville's Inner Vision

To Joseph the act of embalming is not a mere burial custom; it is a statement of consciousness. The body of Israel is embalmed by the physicians because the inner image must not be left to decay in the outer world. In Neville's terms, Joseph knew that the memory and form of Jacob (Israel) live within the state of consciousness called 'me,' and that the inner faculties—imagination, faith, and discernment—are the physicians who preserve that image. Embalming represents the deliberate keeping of an idea intact against time's forgetting, a conscious arrangement of the inner walls to hold the pattern of life. When you realize that you are the I AM, the inner memory of the beloved image cannot fade; you can call forth, by a revised assumption, the exact form of your true self and its relationship to everyone in your life. The scene shows that grace and favor are not distant gifts but acts of awareness under inner guidance. The outward rite mirrors a perpetual inner practice: you preserve the divine image by treating it with reverent attention, and then you live from that secured image, here and now.