The Story of Anna Kingsford and Edward Maitland and of the new Gospel of InterpretationMaitland, Edward
Religion
The Story of Anna Kingsford and Edward Maitland and of the new Gospel of Interpretation
Maitland, Edward
Kingsford, Anna Bonus, 1846-1888; Mysticism
The change in the title of the book from "The Story of the New Gospel of
Interpretation" to the present title calls for some explanation and
justification, because the former title was an excellent one in many
respects, and the book has become known to many by that title. The
"Gospel of Interpretation" is the name or description which was given by
its Divine Inspirers, the Hierarchy of the Spheres Celestial, to the
work of which this book tells the story, in token of its relation to the
previous "Gospel of Manifestation." The former title implied, as the
Author pointed out in his preface, that that which this book propounded
was "not really a new Gospel, but one of Interpretation only"; and this
is not really new, but, as the Author has also pointed out, "so old as
to have become forgotten and lost, being the purely spiritual sense, as
discerned from the purely spiritual standpoint originally intended and
insisted on by Scripture itself as its true sense and standpoint, and
those which alone render Scripture intelligible"[1]. But notwithstanding
this, and notwithstanding that on the front page it was expressly stated
that "There shall nothing new be told; but that which is ancient shall
be interpreted," the former title failed to convey to the minds of some
the meaning that it was intended to convey, and it gave no indication of
the biographical nature of the work. Many who otherwise would have read
the book refrained from doing so because they thought that a new Gospel,
inconsistent with and perhaps opposed to if not intended to supersede
the old Gospel, was propounded. It is necessary, therefore, for me to
state, if possible more explicitly than it was stated in the previous
editions of this book, that this is not an attempt to create a new
Gospel differing from that of Jesus Christ[2]. Anna Kingsford's and
Edward Maitland's mission and aim was to interpret the Christ, not to
rival or supersede Him. The "New Gospel" is, first and foremost,
_interpretative_, and is destructive only in the sense of
reconstructive. "It tells nothing new; it simply restores and reinforces
the old, even the Gnosis, which, as the doctrine of the Church unfallen,
is that also of the Church fallen, though the latter has lost the key to
its interpretation"[3]. Nor is the teaching represented by this book
opposed to the existence of an objective Church. Anna Kingsford and
Edward Maitland fully recognised the necessity of such an organisation
for the formulation, propagation, and exposition of religion. Their
opposition was "only to the recognition by the Church of the objective,
historical, and materialistic aspect of religion, _to the exclusion_ of
that which really constitutes religion, namely, its subjective,
spiritual, and substantial aspect, wherein alone it appeals to the mind
and soul, and is efficacious for redemption." The aim of the New Gospel
"is defined exactly," said Edward Maitland, "in the following citation
from St.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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