This is the story about a book of such immense significance that it can change the life of those who read it. Indeed, if a sufficient number of people read this book, accepting it in their minds and hearts, it can change the life of the entire planet! Because ‘Toward the Light!’, as the title is, tells us about a shortcut that each and everyone can take – a shortcut to escape our lives in this earthly dark world much earlier than would otherwise be possible, such that he or she can continue life in brighter worlds – completely without suffering, illness and death. And life on earth may within a few decades become a life in peace and friendliness for all people – without hunger and suffering and without war and strife.

This is also the story of a woman and a man from a tiny country, Denmark, whose lives were turned completely upside down, when they were called upon by the heavenly spirits requesting them to help as intermediates and as publishers of a book telling us the truth about the origin of man and about why this world has become an arena for the struggle between good and evil.

When Johanne Agerskov (1873-1946) in 1899 married her fiancée, later lecturer and author Michael Agerskov (1870-1933), everything indicated that she was facing a complete normal life as a mother and housewife. The newly married couple settled down in Copenhagen, where the husband for many years worked as a teacher at the Marie Kruse Girls’ School and as a censor at the final exam of teacher training colleges. Michael hailed from a family of high ranking civil servants within the customs services, and his father was a customs inspector in the town of Nykøbing Sjælland, while his mother was of the large family of Grove, richly represented in the officer corps of the Danish navy. One of Michael Agerskov’s uncles was the highly gifted literary scholar Christian Agerskov, considered as the “midwife” of a long line of Danish authors.  He taught Danish language and literature both at the Naval Academy and at the School of ‘Efterslægtselskabet’, where Michael passed his General Certificate of Education. Michael Agerskov also proved himself to be a talented writer and wrote pieces of both prose and poetry as well as publishing a Danish literature textbook for the primary and secondary level school. This textbook was also translated and published in Sweden.

Johanne’s father, Rasmus Malling-Hansen (1835-1890) managed in his life to work himself up from almost nothing to becoming one of the most respected scientific researchers in Denmark, inventor of global renown and occupying a very central position within the Danish education of the deaf-mute in his capacity as priest and principal of the only publicly run institute for the deaf-mute at the time. He received some of the highest Danish awards for his inventions and for his efforts as an educationalist for the deaf-mute, in 1865 marrying Cathrine Georgia Heiberg (1841-1876), the daughter of the previous principal, Søren Johan Heiberg (1810-1871), a personal friend and advisor to the Danish queen.

The Special Gifts of Johanne Agerskov

Already a year after Johanne and Michael’s marriage, Johanne gave birth to the daughter Inger Johanne (1900-1968), but the years that followed would show that the young mother was destined to something far from a quiet life as a housewife. During this period all over Europe there was a wave of interest in spiritistic phenomena, and also in Denmark was formed a circle of interested people who practiced contact with the spiritual world, published magazines and wrote books about their experiences. Johanne herself had, already as a young girl, discovered that she had talents beyond the normal range, and Michael Agerskov in his book “Some Psychic Experiences” from 1922 describes a very special event that took place after her father’s sudden death in 1890. Johanne was standing in the family’s drawing room, grieving her father whose dead body was lying in his study in the adjacent room, when suddenly she heard her father’s voice saying loud and clearly: “I am not dead. I am alive!” Johanne, 17 years old at the time, was of course very happy to hear her father’s voice and ran into his study to see if he really wasn’t dead after all, but in there was her father’s dead body exactly as it had been all the time. However, Johanne had at any rate received her first proof that life isn’t over with the death of the physical body, and many more proofs were later to appear. Johanne also experienced on several occasions that she had a premonition about coming events, and several times she “knew” in advance that the lottery ticket of her fiancée would be drawn. In order to prove her premonition to the others, she once wrote down on a piece of paper that Michael would win a sum of money, sealing the note in an envelope. And only after the draw had been made, did she bring out the envelope, and everybody could see that what she had predicted was exactly what later happened!

Johanne’s father, Rasmus Malling-Hansen, shortly before he passed away in 1890. Photo: Private

Psychic Researchers

However, it was several years later that the contours of what was to become the main task of their life emerged. At a certain time the Agerskov couple got to know and be part of spiritistic circles and very soon had some quite extraordinary experiences, including knocking sounds in the home and a piano string being struck apparently without any person being close to the instrument. Johanne Agerskov herself was a very withdrawn and somewhat skeptical person and she herself had no wish or ambition to be a medium, but she let herself be persuaded by her husband and her elder sister Juliane to participate in table séances. And from a very early stage it became clear to everybody that Johanne was the target of interest from the side of the extrasensory spirits – it was her they wished to contact.  Michael and Johanne obliged the wishes of the spirits and arranged table séances in their home. At such séances they would use a table with three legs, and the spirits could communicate with the persons present by lifting one leg of the table and letting it fall down such as to make a knocking sound. Slowly screening the alphabet it was then possible to confirm which letter to choose by means of the spirit letting the table knock once for yes and two for no. In this rather cumbersome way it was possible to slowly spell words and sentences, dictated by the extrasensory spirits.

The other two couples who regularly participated in the séance circle were (left) Agerskov’s younger sister and her husband, Anna and Karl Lindahl, and Mrs Agerskov’s elder sister and her husband, Juliane and Maximillian Danckert. Left photo: Private – Right: The Royal Library.

Rasmus Malling-Hansen

Soon a small séance-circle of interested people was formed around the Agerskov couple. Apart from the Agerskovs participants were Mr Agerskov’s youngest sister, Anna, and her husband Karl Lindahl, and Mrs Agerskov’s eldest sister, Juliane, and her husband Maximillian Danckert. Both Johanne and Michael Agerskov acted as spiritual intermediaries during the initial period, and Juliane Danckert also had mediumistic gifts. At the time, it was commonplace in spiritistic circles to receive poems from the departed; the Agerskovs also wanted to attempt that, and they suggested a theme that they wished the poem to be about, and after only a few minutes they received a poem from the transcendental world. This activity continued regularly over a period of time, and one evening they were contacted by an obviously despondent and somewhat confused younger man, who at the time had been dead several years. He pleaded with them to help him find some old papers that he had left behind and to destroy them, because he was very anxious that these papers must not be found by other people. He had great problems to explain where the papers were, but since they seemed to remember that Johanne’s father, Rasmus Malling-Hansen, was a friend of his, they asked for Johanne’s father and were told that he also was present in the room. And they could clearly feel that a different spirit now took over the séance table, the knocking was now far more regular and strong; Johanne’s dead father made himself known to them, and it was a very emotional moment for the father as well as for the daughter. Malling-Hansen’s name in the transcendental world is Leo and he belongs to the first group of spirits created by God - the Angels, and Leo could rather quickly and easily tell them where the papers in questions were, such that they could be found and destroyed. He could also confirm to the Agerskov couple that they were on the right track and he asked them to continue their activity.

This must have taken place around 1908-09, and the Agerskovs realized that Leo had contacted them not only in order to get help to locate some papers left behind – there must be something more. To their questions Leo responded that everything would be revealed to them little by little, but that they could be sure God was with them. On Leo’s suggestion, the couple also started to arrange séances with only two participants, and soon they were contacted by deceased persons wishing to communicate and in some cases asked for forgiveness for old sins in previous lives. And the spirits brought them many suffering beings who had not managed to return to their heavenly dwellings at the time of the death of their physical body, because they remained tied to the earth by sin and misdeeds; and often it was enough that the Agerskovs explained to the departed that they were in fact dead, for they perceived themselves as being still alive and living their lives as usual in their old houses. In some cases the couple had to pray lovingly for the departed, and then remorse awakened in the suffering spirits, the fetters of darkness binding them were rent, and exalted spirits appeared and brought them home to the spheres, where all spiritual beings have their home.

At one point in time the séance circle also tried to make spirit photographs, but in spite of receiving a detailed instruction from Leo about how to go about it, none of them had sufficient energy needed for spiritual beings to become visible in the photos.

However, the table séances with knocking sounds was a very demanding and slow method, and on one occasion the spirit dictating a message to Johanne Agerskov suddenly “said” to Johanne Agerskov: - Why don’t you just say what you know I will dictate, since you can in fact “hear” in advance what the sentence will be. And this was quite correct, since Johanne had for some time become aware that she was able to “hear” the thoughts of the spirit in her inner ear, and from then on the work proceed much more speedily, because now the spirits could dictate one sentence at the time, which she would then repeat, speaking out loudly, such that her husband or some other person present could write down the sentence. And they continued to receive, time after time, more departed souls, and among other things they were dictated several incarnation accounts from ancient civilizations, relating in detail about lives in these past times. And on one occasion a departed spirit asked one of the persons present for his forgiveness for past misdeeds, and the spirit was forgiven.

Johanne Agerskov was a very conscientious person, who never compromised with her conscience. According to herself, basically she had remarkable gifts only in one single respect, namely as a medium, but on the other hand her divine mediumistic gifts were refined to the level of the absolute sublime. Copyright: Private.

Michael Agerskov hailed from a very solid family, who for many years had worked as founders and supporters of society, and several of his closest forefathers held very highly trusted offices with the Customs Office, where honesty and reliability constituted the very foundation for the trust in them. Because of his education and work Michael Agerskov himself was a highly trusted man as a lecturer and as a censor at examinations of teacher training colleges in Denmark”. Copyright: Private

Three Golden Fruits.

During the winter of 1910 a very special event took place, making an indelible impression on all the six séance participants. While a spirit was dictating to them, all of sudden there was silence, and he announced that a high spirit had arrived and bade him to be silent. And the newly arrived presented himself as Gabriel, the messenger of the Lord, and he beseeched them to continue the séance circle, because great things were to come out of its center. And he finished by saying: “Three golden fruits shall fall into your lap, Bettina; share these fruits with your fellow beings, but keep the seeds for yourself”. Bettina is Johanne Agerskov’s name in the spheres, and the Agerskov couple now began to properly appreciate that their activities might be of great and decisive importance. “The Three Golden Fruits” later on revealed themselves to be three books dictated to Johanne Agerskov from the transcendental side and published by her husband, Michael Agerskov: “Greeting to Denmark” (1915), “Toward the Light!” (1920) and “The Doctrine of Atonement and the Shorter Road” (1922).

The Meeting with Christ.

In the spring of 1911, a few years after the Agerskov having become involved in spiritistic circles, their activity progressed by leaps and bounds. One evening Michael was reading the Bible and happened upon a sentence that he took particular note of, reflecting that Jesus could not possibly have uttered something like that. He mentioned it to his wife, and she was able to comment that she was “told” that they could learn about the origin of the sentence immediately. They sat down at the séance table and were promptly contacted by the spirit calling himself Christ. He then accounted in detail how the sentence had been adulterated, however that the original core was from him. He asked the Agerskovs if they could accept his explanation, and they confirmed that. He also told them that if they trusted that he was the one he said he was, he would be able to provide them with extraordinary assistance – however first of all they would have to decide for themselves whether they had confidence in him. This was a very decisive moment in the work of the Agerskov couple for the transcendental world, because if they had not trusted that it really was Christ who was contacting them, then their assignment could not be carried out as planned from the transcendental side, because everything had to be done voluntarily and without pressure or force.

One of the poems received by Michael Agerskov during a séance. It is dated 22.01.11, signed “Lilian F.”, the title is “Evening Clouds” and apparently it took 5 minutes to receive. Photo: The Royal Library.

Ardor Turns.

Fortunately both Johanne and Michael felt in their innermost heart that the spirit asking for their trust really was the one he alleged to be, and a few days later he returned, when the entire séance circle was gathered, and dictated a very beautiful allegory to them. On this occasion he did not want to present himself by name, but after having finished dictating the allegory, he asked the persons present if they could tell who he was. And they replied that he was Christ, and all the members of the circle agreed. Christ then pronounced in the name of God a very beautiful blessing over them and their deeds. And it would later turn out that this wasn’t the last time Christ would pay a visit to the Agerskov couple. Because less than a year later Christ returned, and this time in order to bring them a fallen spirit – alas, the spirit who had fallen deepest down of them all, for Christ had succeded in locating the Evil one himself, the prince of darkness – the one that all humans feared and hated – the devil. Christ had promised to bring him to human beings willing to pray for him on his command. The Agerskovs understood immediately that they were confronted by a deeply suffering and darkened being, and out of the goodness of their hearts they forgave him for everything he had sinned against them, and thus the fetters tying the devil to darkness were sundered, and his memories of life in God’s realm were awakened, and by that also the sorrow that he had worked against God and made life for his creations, the humans, a hell. And Christ brought his repenting brother home to God, who immediately forgave him all his sins. In so doing, light had conquered darkness in the spiritual world, and from this moment on darkness had no prince on earth – the throne of the devil was empty. However, this does not mean that darkness on earth has been conquered – it is still present in the earthly world, and only the day when humans themselves have fully learnt to withstand the power of darkness will life on earth change radically, but no longer will the devil stand by the side of humans, imbuing them with evil thoughts and temptations.

I made this small bust in my twenties. I think it is a good illustration of Ardor’s suffering and painful situation. He has beseeched the humans to forgive him, and his painful suffering will not be overcome until each and every human being has forgiven him. Photo: Sverre Avnskog.

Ardor’s Account.

God granted the devil, or Ardor, as he should now be called, a year of rest in heaven in order for him to have time to reflect about everything that had happened during the time when he was the prince of darkness, and God prescribed him, once the period of rest had come to an end, to approach the humans again in order to account for his fall to darkness and to seek the forgiveness of his creations, the humans. And with good cooperation from his spiritual sisters and brothers Ardor tried as well as he could to respond to the questions that the séance circle around the Agerskov couple put to him, and thus appeared “Ardor’s Story” – the first part of “Toward the light!” in which Ardor tells about the beginning of life, about the two forces in the universe – light and darkness – and about how God and his twelve helpers appeared from the light when thought and willpower were united in the light, and about how God created his kingdom with dwellings for himself and his creations. He goes on to tell about the creation of the very first of God’s children, the angels – and about how the struggle between good and evil started when some of the angels succumbed to the temptations of darkness and darkened the planet of light that God had created as the home of the humans, and darkness fecundated some of the multiform life germs created by God, repulsive and gigantic animal species appeared and hideous plants and shrubs, and everywhere was morass and evil odors. Darkness had completely destroyed the beautiful landscape created by God. And in order to try to bring about order in the chaos that darkness had caused on earth, the “eldest” (the name given to the fallen spirits in Toward the Light) created the first human beings, who were rather simian beings without thought and willpower. But some of the eldest still retained some of their capacity for compassion, and they saw that the poor human animals were living a life of suffering and without meaning, for their “mind” did not possess thought or willpower, and were wandering about as ghosts on earth after their bodily death without any possibility to ever obtain consciousness about their own existence. At times there were more “dead” than living humans on earth, but at the instigation of prayers by some of the eldest God assumed responsibility for these miserable creatures and gave their mind a sparkle of his own flaming being, including thought and willpower such that they acquired spiritual consciousness and part of the eternal life. And the youngest took upon themselves, in accordance with God’s will, to guide mankind on earth through many incarnations in order for them to learn how to avoid darkness and grow and evolve so that they might continue their journey in the realms of the light. However, the eldest chose to thwart their younger brothers and sisters (referred to as “the youngest”) in order not to lose control of their creatures, and in this way inflicted immeasurable sufferings upon both humans and their siblings, and they were driven by evil for they were the slaves of darkness and they left no stone unturned to prevent the spread of light on earth.

The Struggle between Good and Evil.

From Ardor’s story we can also learn how light and darkness alternated in growing stronger and weaker – and how the struggle between good and evil fluctuated and changed back and forth. The youngest let themselves be incarnated as pioneers among human beings in order to teach them to speak and learn to use various earthly means and implements in order to make human life easier, and they tried to teach humans to live peacefully, man and woman together so that they could take care of their offspring, in flocks led by some of the oldest humans. And they tried to arouse the understanding of the humans that they had a dear father in heaven to whom they could turn for support. At the same time, the eldest taught humans to make war and kill each other, have many wives and men such that the offspring would suffer, and they tried to arouse humans’ ambition for power, their jealousy and envy. The eldest had their dwellings in what was called the destroyed realm, or hell, for what had once been beautiful homes around the globe had been eroded by the darkness released by the eldest in connection with their falling, and their life in the sphere of hell was one long suffering, but they were fettered by darkness and saw no way out. The ancient myth about a hell is therefore correct, but hell was not created by God as a place for sinners to suffer eternally – hell came about as a consequence of darkness having destroyed the dwellings that God had originally created for his first creatures, as they were meant to guide the humans that God had planned to create from light and who were to live in a world of light where there would be no death and suffering! But planet earth as well as the world of light around the earth were contaminated by darkness because of the fall of the eldest, and earth was turned into a planet of darkness, the lovely dwellings around the globe became a hell, and humans did not become beings of the light such as God had planned it, rather they got a body of darkness and a spirit of light, when God took over responsibility for them.

A Middle Age artist’s representation of the myth of hell. The sphere of hell was created as a consequence of the eldest succumbing to darkness, such that the world of light by which God had encircled the earth was destroyed. Evidently God has never had any wish that anyone should “burn eternally” in hell! Illustration from Wikipedia.

The Incarnations of the Eldest.

A decisive turning point in the struggle between good and evil came around 12000 years before Christ, when the idea appeared with some of the eldest that in order to get away from their sufferings in the sphere of hell they would try to incarnate themselves in human bodies. However only Ardor was able to create a protective layer between spirit and body, hermetic enough for the eldest, incarnated as humans, not to be able to remember their sufferings in hell. And Ardor incarnated all of his brothers and sisters and also wanted to incarnate himself, but then discovered that he did not have sufficient power to create a sufficiently hermetic protective layer, and his life as a human would then be insupportable with the memories of all the evil and suffering he had caused raging in his consciousness, and hence he had to abandon incarnating himself. Thus he found himself alone once more, and in his mind was then rekindled the hatred towards everything and everybody, and in his rage and hatred he hurled virulent maledictions against God, against his elder and younger siblings and against the humans, and these maledictions are hovering as heavy clouds of darkness above the entire planet, pulling the humans down in sin and misdeeds. Only the curses directed towards God were immediately erased by God, for else they would turn back to Ardor himself and annihilate him. But Ardor had to suffer for the curses with which he wished to hit the eldest, the youngest and the humans, because all evil thoughts at the end of the day return to the originator, and he himself has to suffer the torments that he wishes to invoke onto others.

But one of the effects of the incarnations of the eldest was a much stronger resistance against the work of the youngest to help the humans progress, because the protective layer that the eldest had created was not enough to hold back the evil personalities of the eldest, and wherever they incarnated their power-thirsty ambition for power and malevolence made the far weaker human spirits into unresisting tools for their evil schemes to attain the highest positions in temples and as leaders. And their unscrupulous craving to satisfy their thirst for worldly goods and pleasures attracted much darkness upon themselves and the realms where they incarnated. But the eldest soon discovered that when they incarnated as humans they also automatically brought themselves under God’s laws of retribution, and all the evil that they imposed on others was soon turned against themselves, imposing the same sufferings on them, and many of them did not let themselves incarnate anymore, but rather lived their lives in the sphere of hell, where they tried to make copies of their richly adorned earthly abodes, but the copies were like destroyed ruins compared to the originals. These eldest also pulled numerous human spirits with them down into misery, for all those that had been inspired by the eldest to live like them in sin and misery were not capable of lifting themselves up to their dwellings in the spheres when their earthly body died. But many of the eldest forced Ardor to continue to incarnate them, and often he let them have as miserable incarnations as he could imagine and also incarnated male spirits in female bodies and vice versa, and these lives in the “wrong” body became one long suffering for such spirits.  But we know many of these eldest from history as power-thirsty and evil rulers, always at war with neighboring countries and with an insatiable thirst for the luxury of the earthly world. Where the youngest managed to create civilized societies and led mankind several steps ahead towards development, the eldest appeared eventually and pulled the humans back into sin and misery; and where the youngest tried to teach humans to realize that the father of their spirit was a benevolent and loving deity, the eldest taught humans that there are many gods and that humans ought to fear their anger and must placate them with sanguinary sacrificial acts. And where the eldest completely took over the power, the youngest had to abandon their quest to develop society in a more ethical direction, and they often had to start all over again in some other place on earth, and thus the various ancient civilizations were created, flourishing for some time and then foundering again.

Mankind has not been created by evolution rather by super-intelligent spiritual beings. At a later stage God gave us spiritual consciousness such that we have a body of darkness and a spirit of light. Since the eldest were very much characterized by darkness, the various varieties of the first humans did not turn out very attractive, but thanks to the incarnations of the youngest the human body has throughout the millennia become gradually more appealing. Illustration: The internet.

Christ – Leader of Mankind.

The last part of Ardor’s story tells us about the special position of Christ in God’s realm and in relation to mankind. Toward the Light! is a book that addresses men and women of all kinds of faiths, telling us that in the eyes of God all religions contain a flicker of the truth, and God does not ask anyone to which faith they confess, only whether he or she is trying fully and seriously to live life in accordance with the best in his/her personality, looking for the deeper values in his religion and not attaching importance to superficial and customary aspects. But when God asked the youngest to help him to lead the humans towards the light and let themselves be incarnated among them, most of the youngest recoiled from this task, for they realized immediately that it would mean they would have to endure enormous sufferings and hardships by exposing themselves to the darkness ruling on earth, and only Christ and his dual had the emotional depth and empathy that enabled them immediately to volunteer for the task, and God made Christ the leader of the youngest, and by this he also became the highest leader in the endeavor to take humans forward towards the light in ever developing maturity. This is why Christ shoulders a very special position in relation to humans as well as to God. However, many of the youngest have also made very valuable contributions in the sense of bringing religious truths to the humans, and Buddha, Muhammed, Zwingli as well as Luther were among these youngest who tried to make mankind progress in terms of religious understanding, but as humans none of them succeeded in avoiding the influence of the darkness, and hence what they taught was not the pure and unadulterated doctrine that they had hoped to bring. Incidentally, Buddha and Muhammed were animated by the same high spirit, and Luther was the reincarnated Paul.

According to Toward the Light! Christ has incarnated as a human being five times, and it was in his last incarnation that he lived as Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus was not born by a virgin but was conceived in a perfectly natural way through intercourse between a man and a woman. As the human being Jesus, Christ had a two part-task. The first one was to pray for his fallen brother Ardor, because by praying for Ardor, the prince of darkness would be won back into the light, and thus the way would be open for Jesus to accomplish the second part of his mission – to win over the people and their leaders for his new doctrine of love and to teach humans about their true relationship with God: that God loves all of his creatures with the same unlimited force, and that no one will ever perish and everyone will be heard by God if they pray from a sincere heart. But unfortunately Jesus did not succeed in recalling his promise to God prior to his incarnation to pray for Ardor. In the decisive moment Ardor managed to awaken fear in his heart and to envelop Jesus in darkness, such that Jesus misunderstood the situation and ask God’s help for himself instead of praying for Ardor. With this, Jesus also could not manage to accomplish the second part of this mission with sufficient authority, and Ardor stirred the leaders and the people against Jesus and in the end succeeded in grinding down Jesus’ confidence that his mission would be fruitful, and he saw no other way out than letting his words be confirmed by voluntarily meeting his death.

Painting by Carl Heinrich Bloch, entitled “The Sermon on the Mount”. Illustration: Wikipedia.

Paul Invented The Doctrine of Atonement!

According to Toward the Light! it never occurred to Jesus that his death was to be a sacrifice of atonement for the sins of mankind, and God also does not need such a sacrifice for humans to be saved. God truly and dearly loves each and every human being, and by giving each human spirit a sparkle of his own scintillating being, God has provided everybody part of eternal life, and nobody can possibly sink so deep down into darkness and sin that it is impossible to get up again. The idea of Jesus’ death as a sacrifice of atonement initially emerged in the thinking of Paul, the Jewish scribe who began as a zealous persecutor of the first Christians, but then saw Jesus for his inner eye on his way to Damascus and eventually became a mighty paladin for Christ’s new teachings of love and forgiveness. But Paul was a proud and self-righteous man, and he did not get along very well with Jesus’ disciples, and instead of talking to those that had walked with Jesus when he was alive, he himself wanted to reflect over the meaning of Jesus’ life and death, and in his thoughts (inspired by Ardor) emerged the idea that Jesus died as a sacrifice of atonement in the new pact between God and the humans, such that the humans could partake of eternal life. And when Paul pondered about what could have happened at Jesus’ last meal together with his disciples, in his mind he made up that Jesus had spoken the words that we know from the gospels about bread being his body and wine his blood to be shed in the new pact between God and humans. According to Toward the Light! Jesus has never thought like that or uttered anything like this, but since all congregations that Paul formed used these words by the memorial meals for Jesus at Easter, they eventually had a large following, and in the end were included in the gospels and were attributed Jesus himself.

Jesus Appeared in his Spiritual Body!

Ardor’s story also has the explanation to what happened with Jesus’ body after the crucifixion – for according to Toward the Light! it is not correct that Jesus was resurrected in his earthly body after his death! God never goes against the physical or heavenly laws, and once the bond between spirit and body has been severed, no man can return to life, and the bodily death is irreversible. It was like that also for Jesus. It was the scribe Joseph of Arimathea who had the responsibility for the confusion arising when the body of Jesus had disappeared and for the ensuing belief that he had been resurrected in his earthly body. Joseph of Arimathea was a very rich Jewish scribe, harboring a deep longing to see the Messiahs that the prophets had promised would appear to release the Jews from their sufferings, and when he heard people talking about Jesus, he wanted to go and see him in order to find out whether he could be the alleged Messiah who was to come to the Jewish people. And he called on Jesus and talked with him, asking why he spoke against the scribes, since it was their task to teach the people about God. But if Jesus really was the promised Messiah, Joseph wanted him to show him a sign to prove it, and then he would speak for Jesus in front of the Council and make sure that he was put in his rightful place as the new king of the Jews! Joseph was also one of the youngest, and before his incarnation he had promised God to help and support Jesus in his mission. Jesus understood in his heart how important the rich man’s support was for him, but Ardor was standing between them and stirred them against each other. And Jesus demanded from Joseph that he must sell all of his worldly goods and distribute the money among the poor and then follow Jesus as an equal to the poor, and he became very much provoked by the fact that Joseph, based on what Jesus taught and through his deeds among the poor and the sick, did not understand that he was worth all support, and he did not manage to control his anger against Joseph. And they separated as enemies. However, Joseph was very much attracted by Jesus’ beautiful words to the people and could often be seen in the audience, and frequently God “whispered” to him in his inner mind that he should support Jesus; but Joseph was beset by doubt and dared not support Jesus openly. But he also did not dare be among those that judged Jesus, and when the Jerusalem Council condemned Jesus to be crucified, it took place without Joseph of Arimathea being present. Also several other members of the priesthood and the council encouraged Jesus to make himself available as the new king of the Jews, and the rumor about the royal candidate Jesus also reached the Roman occupational power, and Pontius Pilate planned to arrest Jesus in order to prevent a possible revolt. However, the leader of the council, Caiaphas, was notified about the impending arrest and in order to prevent Pilate from learning about the council connection with Jesus and hence acquire ammunition to make accusations against them, Caiaphas quickly took the strategic action to have Jesus arrested and accused of being a rebel, and the council condemned him to death and sent him to the Romans in order to have the sentence endorsed and carried out. Thanks to the speedy initiative of Caiaphas it became impossible for the Romans to accuse the Council of being behind the revolt, and at the same time they got rid of Jesus. He was definitely no political rebel, but his opposition against the established Jewish faith caused great and constant irritation with the Jewish priesthood. Pontius Pilate saw through this initiative and understood that Jesus was innocent, but because of his own weak position at this point in time, he did not dare go against the council of the Jews, but instead tried to have Jesus released by following an old custom to let the people select a man who had been sentenced to death and set him free, and he gave them the choice between Jesus and another man in the hope that the people would choose Jesus, whom everybody knew was innocent of what he was convicted for. But the people wanted otherwise and thus Pontius Pilate endorsed the death sentence of the innocent Jesus in order to save his own position.

Joseph of Arimathea had often heard from Jesus’ followers that they believed Jesus would be resurrected from the dead after his demise, because Jesus had promised the disciples that if God permitted he would show himself to them after his death. In order to ensure that the followers of Jesus would not claim this to have happened without it being a true fact, Joseph got the idea of offering them to place the body of the dead Jesus in the tomb prepared for himself, because in this way he himself could retain complete control over the body and prevent that false rumors about the resurrection of Jesus be spread. But once again Ardor wished to exploit the situation to create confusion, and he inspired Joseph to bring along a servant and to remove the dead body of Jesus from the carved stone cave and bury it in the garden. And fearing that the old servant would expose him, Joseph poisoned him. And when Mary Magdalene and some other women came a day afterward in order to wash and prepare the body of Jesus, they did not find it; but because of Maria’s love and longing for Jesus, he showed himself to her in his spiritual body, for Maria was clairvoyant and saw him with the eyes of her mind. And Jesus also showed himself to the disciples on one occasion, also in his spiritual body but materialized with the permission of God, so that everybody could see him, but it is Joseph of Arimathea that bears the responsibility for the misunderstanding that Jesus arose from the dead in his physical body. He showed himself in the spiritual body that can never die – and this goes for all of God’s creatures. And if Joseph had succeeded in his mission, we would also have had more substantial accounts of Jesus’ life, because he was the one appointed by God to write down Jesus’ speeches to the people.

Thorvaldsen’s sculpture of Christ in the Church of Our Savior (“Vor Frelsers Kirke”), Copenhagen. Photo: The Internet.

The Savior Mission of Jesus.

But what about the savior Jesus – is there nothing left of his mission as the savior? Yes absolutely, but the idea that God would want his son to lose his life as an atonement is, according to Toward the Light! not true. It is not death that can save human beings from darkness – rather it is love! And Jesus was the one who by means of his never faltering love and compassion with the sufferings of mankind could finally break the power of darkness in the spiritual world and redress the divergence that emerged when some of God’s creatures succumbed to darkness and began their virulent struggle against God and the light, using planet earth as the arena, and turning humans into suffering victims.

But in spite of the struggle of the eldest to maintain the earth in the power of darkness, in the long run they still could not withstand the efforts of the youngest for the light to prevail. God’s millstones grind slowly, but when God has made up his mind, in spite of everything else, this will become a reality in the long run. And even if several civilizations after each other perished, at the end the youngest succeeded in conquering the European lands. The reason why the youngest concentrated their work on this part of the world was that this was where Christianity spread, and the youngest sought during the first centuries after the life of Jesus first and foremost to cleanse Christianity from the adulterations Ardor had managed to sneak into Jesus’ simple and beautiful teachings about love. But at one point in time, when the youngest were close to giving up their struggle, because the eldest always managed to break down what they attempted to build up, Christ – being the only one that did not agree with giving up the task of guiding the humans towards the light – requested that they seek God to obtain his help. And God spoke to them and showed them how they could win – as an alternative to focusing almost all of their forces towards cleansing Christianity from darkness – through improving humans’ lives by making inventions that could facilitate their lives, by developing medicine and find cures for various diseases, by researching the unknown forces of planet earth and unexplored parts of the land mass and by creating new pieces and works within all areas of the arts. Many ideas, long time forgotten, were pulled out from oblivion, new gems of thinking and invention originated, providing the humans new understanding. And by achieving this task, the youngest managed to lead mankind ahead in terms of spiritual and cultural progress, and light spread gradually more and more across the globe. The victory of the light was not far away.

The Shorter Road.

In the mid 19th century God called Jesus to him and explained that he had come up with a shortcut that could lead the work of Jesus and the youngest for the light towards victory. Because for an extended period of time, the eldest had appeared through spiritual media, and this kind of spiritism had started to spread and flourish, and the eldest created much confusion through séances, because they transferred many false and erroneous pieces of information. However, God can always turn the schemes of darkness into something good, and in his omniscience he realized that also the youngest could use this method to communicate directly with humans. If the youngest also contacted some of the earthly media and managed to win over their confidence and trust for the course of the light, a lot of good could be achieved and many of the truths about the origin of mankind and its relationship to God, which the youngest had only succeeded in conveying to mankind in bits and pieces, could be provided in a single coherent presentation, completely unadulterated by darkness. And if it was possible to have humans pray for the earthbound spirits, then these could be won back to the light, and this was valid not the least for the one that had fallen deeper than any other - Ardor! Consequently the assignment might bring great victories for the light, but it would also entail enormous sacrifices and strains for those that took upon themselves to carry it out, because they would have to stay permanently for many years, without pause, in darkness in the devastated realm and on earth, and for the spiritual beings this is a very unpleasant experience. But God promised Christ that if he would follow this shortcut – the shorter road – then brighter times would come for all! And in order to ease the work of Christ and the youngest God incarnated some of the youngest and very advanced human spirits with a view to having them serve as media for the discarnated youngest.

Some of these incarnated youngest were Johanne and Michael Agerskov and their friends in the small séance circle they formed in Denmark in the beginning of the 20th century. And from TtL we know that the shorter road that God had shown to the youngest succeeded fully, and Johanne and Michael Agerskov used the rest of their lives in the service of the light, praying for the fallen and serving as media when the true story of the origin of mankind and our relationship to God was dictated by the spirits of light and thus appeared in the terrestrial world.

When God saw that Christ and the youngest had succeeded in winning the trust of the séance circle around the Agerskov couple and that they through their loving and self-sacrificing work paved the way for more and more of the earthbound spirits to be able to return home to their dwellings in the spheres, God felt that the work of the youngest was close to being victorious, and he let his voice sound over the earth and in the destroyed realm, calling on the spirits still bound by darkness, and everybody except the eldest and his dual stopped and listened to God’s call. And they could all be brought home to the spheres, and God erased once and for all that which humans know as hell, the destroyed realm of the eldest – and hence the sphere of hell is no more. Only Ardor and his dual were still fleeing around on the planet, trying to hide from God and Christ. But Christ found Ardor and was all of a sudden in front of him in his glorious appearance, asking his brother to listen to him. However Ardor was paralyzed from fear and was convinced that God’s wrath would crush and exterminate him, but Christ asked him to come along, for he wanted to take him to human beings who in love and compassion would pray for him. And little by little hope was awakened in Ardor’s tormented mind, and he followed his brother to Michael and Johanne Agerskov, and they, incarnated with the task of helping Christ, prayed from the compassion of their hearts for Ardor, and his memory awakened of life in heaven before  his fall into darkness and with that also remorse for all the terrible cruelties to which he had exposed his brothers and sisters, and the youngest brought him to God, who immediately forgave him all his sins, but who also pointed out to him that each and every one of his creatures who has had to live in the earthly world of darkness instead of in the worlds of light must forgive him before his evil suffering will be over. And this is why Ardor’s story in Toward the Light ends with a heartfelt prayer from the deeply suffering Ardor for forgiveness from us human beings! And if we forgive him, the bonds that are fettering us to his maledictions will burst and will be replaced by bonds of love – and by doing so we will contribute to the victory of the light on earth coming a big step closer, such that life on earth can become a life in peace and prosperity for all people, and we will liberate ourselves from the heavy darkness to which we are fettered through Ardor’s maledictions, and brighter times will also come for us as humans! Hence, forgiving Ardor will contribute to a shortcut to the light for ourselves, apart from contributing to the light for the entire mankind! Not bad!

Later, both Ardor’s dual and the other eldest turned back into the light. We don’t know exactly when Ardor’s dual turned, because it is not mentioned in Toward the Light!, but it probably happened not long time after Ardor having turned. The spiritual beings created by God were always created in pairs in order to fill and complement each other and belong together for all eternity. With female beings the faculty of thought is always stronger than the willpower and vice versa with the male beings. And if someone finds it strange that Toward the Light! is almost entirely about male beings, it is because they are the ones to carry out in practice the thoughts of their female dual and hence they are, to a larger extent, the acting and active beings. But the female duals have been at least equally important in the struggle for the light, having incarnated as humans as well as having contributed as guardian angles. But willpower must fecundate thinking in order for it to be converted into action, and this is why the male beings have been carrying out the struggle in practice. But as a matter of fact it was with Christ’s dual that the compassion with mankind awakened first, while it was the attentiveness in relation to the thoughts of his dual that led him to coming forward in order to help them. It was also the dual of the eldest that initially fell for darkness in her thoughts, while Ardor converted the thought into reality.

In actual fact, what happened at the time of the fall of the eldest was that God presented it as an open issue to all of his first creations, the angels, which of them he wanted to select for the task of leading the new, more immature beings that he wished to create – the human beings. And in letting the choice being an open one, he put the angels in a situation where they had the option of being chosen or not being chosen – and this was a situation which the angels had never before experienced, since they had been living a life totally without worries in God’s kingdom. They had been taught about the possibilities of the light and the darkness both by God and his twelve assistants, but they themselves had no experience of darkness, and those who have not yet confronted darkness can never be productive and constructive beings, rather they will always remain immature, and this is why God sooner or later had to let the angels meet darkness, for otherwise they would remain children, spiritually spoken. Those of the angels who had chosen to study the more scientific aspects of life gradually began to feel that they should be chosen, because they thought that they ought to be the most suitable to lead the immature spirits that God wanted to create, and they frequently went to the beautiful realm where humans would have their dwellings – planet earth. And little by little self-admiration grew imperceptibly in their minds, and they had by then already fallen for darkness, and the power of darkness over their thoughts accelerated in strength without them being aware of it. And it was those of the angels who were more artistically inclined that had the power to resist darkness, for they immediately resisted the temptation of the darkness and thus did not allow darkness to gain access to their thoughts and minds. Incidentally, the designation ‘the youngest’ and ‘the eldest’ is only used in Toward the Light! in order to tell the difference between those of the angels that fell to darkness and who did not. They were, in reality, created in the same instant all of them.

When the spiritual beings incarnate as humans, willpower and the faculty of thought may be both stronger and weaker with men as well as with women, depending on what they have brought into their human personality. Through the protective layer, between the physical and the spiritual brain, is a tread of light woven into the spiritual brain, and which faculties and talents from the spiritual personality the human being will be equipped with depends on in which areas of the psychic brain the tread of light is woven. For instance, the youngest bring only a very, very tiny fraction of their full personality when they incarnate on earth. The protective layer prevents the remainder of the spiritual personality’s knowledge and memories from reaching our earthly consciousness.

Incidentally, Toward the Light! is very clear in relation to the main responsibility of the women to take care of their children and provide them a good care and upbringing, and while the children are small the care of the children must be the main task of all women! This is the very first thing God will ask every woman when she returns after having lived on earth: whether she has taken care of her young ones when they were small. Children suffering from lack of care will often remain marked by that for the rest of their lives and will be much easier victims of various temptations and will have difficulties in finding a safe place as good citizens. This view of the special responsibility of women for the children is quite contrary to the general trend of thought in many western countries, where many women wish to take an active parts in society or make out a professional career for themselves rather than dedicate themselves totally to the children, and in this respect many people are not in harmony with God’s will in our time. That the women have the main responsibility for the children obviously does not exempt the fathers from their responsibility – on the contrary; but their responsibility is first and foremost about catering for the economic and physical safety of their families. And when the children have grown up and are no longer dependent upon parental care, then the right of the women to participation in all areas she may wish in society is self-evident!

Also when it comes to abortion, Toward the Light! is abundantly clear; abortion is in all cases something negative and may only be carried out in cases where the mother’s life is in danger in case the pregnancy is continued. The condition that the pregnancy may be unwanted or does not fit into the plans of the woman or the man cannot justify taking the life of the small fetus that is completely and absolutely innocent in relation to its own conception, and each and everyone who contributes to an abortion assumes a very great responsibility by sacrificing the very weakest part, namely the child. In the cases where a woman has become pregnant as a consequence of rape, from the transcendental side this unjustness will be counterbalanced by attaching a high spirit to the progeny, such that the child will become a great joy and treasure for the woman and her family!

When Ardor had returned, the eldest who were still incarnated as humans were told about it, and God requested them to voluntarily set a new time and day of death such that they could all return at a much earlier time than planned by Ardor when he incarnated them. But only very few accepted this and since God never forces anyone it was their own choice that was decisive. Those that chose to continue life on earth were then requested to limit their ability to evacuate the body during sleep, such that they would lose the possibility to move around on the planet and cause damage by their evil influence on thought waves. Many of the eldest accepted this, but some did refuse this limitation and they kept all their superior capabilities which all of the eldest possess – and these eldest continued the struggle against the light, and we know for instance Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Mao and several others. But the last of these elders died before the year 2000, such that none of them is presently alive on earth, and therefore despots such as Hitler and Stalin will therefore never again emerge. Fortunately!

God promised the youngest that brighter times would come for all if they would follow “the Shorter Road”! Photo: Sverre Avnskog.

Allegories.

After Ardor’s story follows a chapter in Toward the Light! with some allegories dictated by Christ. During the years from the time when the Agerskov couple initially established contact with spiritism and until the dictation of what was to become Toward the Light!,  they had necessarily to go through a phase of learning, where they learned to trust the transcendental spirits and became used to the working methods used for the production of the great message. It was in this period that most of the allegories of Christ were dictated, and the allegories were made in order to explain and illustrate particular laws of the spiritual and earthly world, and many of them also have an explanatory part in order to facilitate the understanding of the reader.

The Speech of Christ.

After the allegories follows the speech of Christ, in which he promises us that he will lead each and every one of us through our journey towards the light, and that he will not let go of a single one of us before we by his help have reached God’s realm! And Christ explains some of the laws and rules for the journey of mankind on earth, and he directs some admonitory words to all of us, young as well as old, to those that hold office within a church or in society and to the ordinary man and woman! Christ presents a message of love, tolerance and peace, where all of us take our responsibility as human beings seriously and do not expose anyone to injustice or suffering. And to those that make mistakes, to the aberrant and suffering, he gives the promise that he will never let them down, and for those who have lost their belief that a prayer to God can help he will never forget to pray!

The Speech of God’s Servant.

Then follows a speech by one of God’s twelve servants, and it is on the one hand a very austere and admonishing appeal to mankind to develop further from the mentally childish state where we have been so far, and the speech certainly does not lack chastisement, but it ends with some of the most beautiful and loving words one can imagine and describes God’s loving yearning for us in a very heart-stirring way. And we learn that God’s patience with us is infinite and that his love to each one of us is without limit!

The Comment.

After this speech there is a long chapter called ‘the comment’, written by Leo, the spiritual personality of Rasmus Malling-Hansen, and here he follows up on Ardor’s story, section for section, expounds in depth and explains all the issues in a more exhaustive manner. Among other things Leo relates that the designations ‘light’ and ‘darkness’ should be seen as abstract notions and have been chosen because they, in the terrestrial world, are the most suitable terms to illustrate the contrast between the two forces. They are two strongly magnetic powers at play, and as a result of thought and will-power having united with the poles of light, light exists perpetually while darkness has become perishable, and in the light are all the possibilities of goodness and in darkness all possibilities of evil. God created himself and all his creations from the light, and therefore we are all beings of light in  discarnated state, even if we are dressed in a physical body when we incarnate on earth as human beings. Light as well as darkness comes in many shapes and forms, from the spiritual to physical matter, and in God’s realm and in the spheres everything is as real as on earth, for everything is built up by light particles of solid matter, albeit invisible for the eyes of the physical human being. In the same way do the physical bodies appear vaguely as nebulous shadows, when seen from the spiritual angle. Our physical bodies and every physical matter on earth are formed by the coarsest particles of darkness. Hence, it was in fact God’s intention that the earth was to be a planet of light, and that humans should be a being of light, such that death and transience would not exist in the human world; however, the fall of the eldest to darkness made darkness creep across the planet and destroyed the magnificent world of light created by God, and it was in fact the eldest that created the first humans, but because their mind was confused by darkness the first human shapes were not particularly beautiful, rather they were more akin to primitive simian human animals. The monkeys and apes we know in our time have, incidentally, been produced as a result of the first humans having mated with animals, for the eldest had equipped them with an unruly and vigorous sexual drive in order to ensure that the species would continue to exist. It has been one of the main tasks of the incarnated youngest to repress the sexual drive in human beings, because the excessively strong sexual drive implanted by the eldest into humans has frequently resulted in humans not being able to live with only one single partner and also not taking proper care of all of their children, for instance when they have been born out of wedlock as a result of infidelity. Such children frequently suffer damages and do not get the protection, love and care that parents have the responsibility to provide all their children, whether they have been born within or out of wedlock. In this respect very many fathers have transgressed badly throughout history! The strong sexual urge has also often had as a consequence that the youngest have become completely unsuitable to carry out the great achievements they had planned, because the eldest have managed to provoke their lust and render them sexually insatiable, and this has often attracted so much darkness around them that they have strayed completely out of course. As a consequence of the youngest having concentrated much of their powers on purifying the teachings of Jesus and to raise humans culturally, the sexual drive in human beings is today artificially strong, and in future it will become an important task for the youngest to reduce the urge and provide a more cultivated sexual drive for future generations to inherit.

The comment was written by Leo, the spiritual personality of Rasmus Malling-Hansen. Here is Malling-Hansen in a painting from 1887 by Malthe Engelstedt. From left: Erik Ritzau, Ludvig Feilberg, R.Malling-Hansen, Anna Ritzau and Johannes Kaper. Copyright: Private.

Dwellings in the Spheres.

When God, following the request of some of the eldest, assumed responsibility for their miserable creatures, God created six new worlds around the globe, and he placed them outside the destroyed realm, one outside the other as layers of spheres, and he made them in such a way that they became increasingly brighter the further away from the globe you traveled. This is where humans and the youngest have their dwellings in between incarnations, and the youngest spirits live in the realm closest to the earth, and gradually as they develop in terms of maturity they acquire new dwellings further away from the earth. Furthest out, in the sixth sphere, the youngest have their dwellings, and this is where they live while leading the journey of the humans as their guardian spirits, for every human is being watched by one of the exalted spirits, one of the youngest or one of the eldest who turned at a very early stage and is now working in the service of the light. You may see the guardian spirit as a kind of strengthened conscience, and it tries to lead us into the roads that we planned to follow before our incarnation and also protects us against threatening dangers in case we have, through our own sins from previous incarnations, brought ourselves under the law of retribution and therefore are lacking protection in certain situations. If we, before our incarnation, have planned to carry out particularly good deeds, the guardian spirit also attempts to awaken our interest for the areas in which we have planned to be active. In the case of the youngest, it will often be about creating new inventions within areas such as science and medicine, excel as brilliant and peace-loving leaders on earth, strive for religious reforms or create new pieces of art within music, literature, painting or sculpture, for the youngest have always been active as pioneers of mankind, and it is thanks to their tireless efforts that we have progressed, such that life has become easier for large parts of mankind. But there is still much to be done before all of mankind can partake in the development that the youngest have given to the world.

The Law of Retribution.

To ensure that everything would be totally righteous for humans on their journeys, God created the law of retribution, and it works quite automatically in such a way that we all have to atone for our sins, and all evil thoughts and deeds at the end will turn against ourselves, such that we must suffer for whatever evil we have caused others. But above the law of retribution is God’s love and mercy, and whoever repents and asks for forgiveness will not be subject to the harshest provisions of the law of retribution but can atone for his sins by a deed a love, whereby, e.g., one saves as many people from death as one has caused to die for instance because of irresponsible conduct as a pilot, train driver or similar.
But there is one particular situation where the law of retribution will always be applied in its very harshest form, and that is when a person has committed murder in an incarnation and has managed to evade punishment in the earthly world. In such a case God will order him to save a person from death, but he himself will be without the protection of the guarding spirit, and the saving act will then in most cases result in him becoming seriously wounded or killed in the moment of saving the other person. If a person does not have past sins of this type to atone for, then the guardian spirit will always give warning if dangers are threatening and will always be able to lead the person out of life-threatening situations. The light is not without means to protect a person in this respect.

The Triple Consciousness of Man.

We must also mention the explanation of Toward the Light in relation to how the human consciousness is formed. Our consciousness consists of three parts: the physical, the astral and the spiritual brain. Our physical brain has no independent consciousness, rather it works only as a kind of receiving station, much like a television passing on the signals it receives. Our astral brain is made up of the finer particles of darkness and can be compared with an automatic container where all the impressions we receive are being stored and can be reproduced without any independent reflection. In the astral brain are also stored our instincts and lower urges and drives, and also the collective heritage or memory, i.e. the experiences and skills collected by our species throughout centuries and which can be inherited by new offspring. We share the physical and astral brain with the animals, because all living creatures are made up of both a physical and an astral part. If God had not attached a spiritual being to the physical body, we would have been thinking, reacting and living just like the animals – totally without a spiritual personality and conscience. But in addition man is equipped with a spiritual brain, and this is where our proper consciousness resides, and the purpose of human life is to let the spirit be the “ruler” in our consciousness, always try to follow the overview that the spirit and our consciousness can provide us with and try to cultivate the inherited instincts in an ethical direction. Instincts can be good as well as evil. Among the good ones we have for instance the maternal instinct, an instinctive desire to protect the weak, considerateness etc.  Among the negative ones we may include the drive within strong individuals to dominate the weaker, an unruly sexual urge, a tendency to violence etc. Obviously no one rid him- or herself of instincts, but we can all try to ameliorate them such that we may pass on better instincts to our offspring in order to facilitate for them to live better in harmony with their conscience without having to constantly fight against evil thought impulses from the astral brain. And in many cases the automatic container that the astral brain is, is an absolute necessity, for instance when we need to turn certain skills into automatic techniques. For instance, when we learn to drive a car, we are completely dependent upon the process whereby the basic movements gradually become automatic and can be done without thinking about them, such that the consciousness can focus on the traffic situation and where to go etc. If we were not equipped with the astral brain, our consciousness would have to think about each and every small movement to make, and we would not be capable of carrying out many different actions simultaneously and would of course not be able to focus on the traffic situation.

Ether Images.

In Toward the Light! we also learn about an important reason why changes for the better in the world take such a long time, in spite of Ardor turning back to the light almost 100 years ago. First of all, darkness is still hovering very heavily above the earth, and as long as only very few people have forgiven Ardor most people remain tied to Ardor’s maledictions with a harness of darkness, and even if the throne of darkness is empty such that darkness does not have a leading intelligence, darkness continues to cause war, suffering and death on earth. But God is still cleansing out more and more of the darkness, and the youngest also contribute to a high extent to bringing light energy to the ether, and therefore brighter times are definitely coming for all of us, just like God promised Christ and the youngest when they began on the shorter road. But the biggest stumbling block against improvements is probably that Ardor before his return concocted evil plans for what he imagined and wanted to happen on earth during the next few centuries, and these evil plans are stored in the ether as images of the future. He made ether images both for individuals and for entire nations, and once the intended target persons and nations embark upon the evil lines of thought that work as the trigger mechanism of the ether images, one evil thought will be strengthened and lead to the next, which in its turn will lead to the actions previously contrived by Ardor. Such ether images are behind many of the evil acts on earth, and both the first and the second world war were thought up and planned by Ardor. Once the ether images are stored in the ether no one can erase them, but God and the youngest are doing everything they can to prevent them from becoming reality on earth, by trying to lead humans in the decisive moments, by warning them against following the thought inspiration of the ether images. And if all human beings at all times follow their consciousness, the ether images will not be able to be activated, because they are weakened if we resist their thought inspiration, and if an ether image becomes sufficiently weakened, God and the youngest can lead its evil flows of thought away from earth. Hence, there is only one certain way to resist the ether images, and that is to follow one’s conscience.

In order to maintain mankind in darkness Ardor created ether images, that can be described as “mental bombs”, kept in the ether. If you succumb to the evil thought flow of an ether image this will cause a chain reaction of evil thoughts and finally these will be launched as destructive acts, all in accordance with Ardor’s designs. Photo: The Internet.

Summary Overview and Post Scriptum.

The last chapter in Toward the Light! is a summarizing overview and a short post scriptum. Here some of the issues are explained and treated in-depth, and in the post-scriptum there is an account of how the work with Toward the Light! was carried out, and on the last page the spiritual leader of the work signs with the name of his last incarnation, R.Malling-Hansen, former priest and principal of the Royal Institute for the Deaf-Mute in Copenhagen, May 1916.

Toward the Light! was printed and published in Denmark in 1920, and after instruction from extrasensory side the work was distributed to all Danish bishops and to around 60 priests. According to Toward the Light! these persons had, before their lives, promised to work for a reformation of the Danish church on the basis of the information provided in Toward the Light! Such a reformation would have echoed all over the world and would have prepared the ground for similar reformations in many Christian countries, and mankind would have gained a much more truthful idea of God and of their own relationship with him. Instead of many of them continuing to turn to Jesus instead of to God, believing all their sins to have been atoned for by Jesus, mankind would learn to approach only the father of their spirit for help, and they would have been able to learn that each and every one of us has to take the complete responsibility for our own acts. This would have strengthened the light all over the planet, and much darkness would have been cleansed out! But unfortunately the Danish church did not react – alas, it is likely that Toward the Light! was not even read by the priests, because the darkness was still strong enough to be able to prevent them from discovering the kind of gift they were facing.

Greeting to Denmark.

In addition to Toward the Light! “the three golden fruits” consist of two other books: “Greeting to Denmark” from 1915 and “The Doctrine of Atonement and the Shorter Cut” published in 1922. In addition, in 1929 and 1930 two supplements were published in which quite a number of questions that different persons had made in reference to TtL were replied to from the extrasensory world. However, the very first publication was “Greeting to Denmark” and this work contained poems written by great and deceased Danish poets, known from the “Golden Age”, a period in the history of Denmark when many of the youngest were incarnated in Denmark in order to create world literature. Many of these youngest were in the spheres in discarnated form in the beginning of the 20th century, and God assigned them to create poems in a style very typical for them when they lived on earth as poets and created literature. These poems were collected in a book, published and sent to many literature experts in Denmark, and the hope from the extrasensory side was that the literature experts would recognize the poems and through their understanding and professional acumen would vouch for these poems to have been written by the said poets. In this way the book could serve as a proof of the continued life of the spirit after the demise of the body. But unfortunately things did not turn out as planned from the extrasensory side. None of the literature experts who received the book wished to come forth as witness for the veracity of the origin of the poems and refer to his or her knowledge of the poets. Either darkness prevented them from recognizing the poems, or they did not want to or dare risk their position.

The Doctrine of Atonement and the Shorter Road.

On March 30 the main work, “Toward the Light!” was distributed to the Danish bishops and around 60 priests of the Danish church. Soon after in the same year “The Doctrine of Atonement and the Shorter Road” was published – the preface is dated July 1920. Based upon the way the clergymen so far had reacted to receiving TtL, it may perhaps be presumed that from the extrasensory side it had already been understood that the work would not be able to achieve a break-through at this point in history and would not lead to the desired reformation of the Danish church. However, apparently there was a desire to make more attempts to remind the priests about their promise, and in “The Doctrine of Atonement and the Shorter Road” three spiritual personalities address the Danish priests and bishops in order to entice them to take action, if possible. The first part of the book was written by Paul, and in here he assumes total responsibility for the false doctrines of atonement having been included into the teachings of Jesus, and he tries to explain the Jewish rules for what could be accepted as a sacrifice of atonement to God and compare this with the conditions around the crucifixion of Jesus and thus prove that Jesus’ death in no way could be regarded as a true sacrifice, because the crucifixion in important points was against the strict Jewish rules. And Paul apologizes deeply and sincerely for his guilt in Christianity having become an adulteration of Jesus’ simple and beautiful teachings, and he asks us to understand that he was motivated by his own great love for Jesus, and that he wanted to make Jesus even greater than he really was. The second part is a speech by Christ, and we can clearly feel his great sorrow that the Christians have exalted him unto a divine level, and he beseeches mankind to stop seeing him as God, for in his own eyes his love is only to be regarded as a fleck in relation to the entire universe if we compare it to God’s love for mankind, and he does not wish to be anything else than our brother, and we realize that the burden of divinity which Christianity has put on his shoulders has been immensely heavy to carry, because it has put Christ in God’s stead and prevented the Christians from communicating directly with God, the father of our spirit, and they have preferred asking Christ for help. The paradox is that many of the Christians in this respect are completely at odds with one of Jesus’ most important messages to mankind, namely that each and every one of us has in his or her heart a direct channel to God. The last speech is by Ignatius Loyola, and in a heartfelt and admonitory speech to mankind he clarifies how much it will mean to forgive Ardor, since we will be unfettered from the maledictions Ardor has launched all over mankind, and hence will follow the shorter road that God has shown us in Toward the Light!

Johanne Agerskov also received ancient Egyptian symbols and images of gods together with some incarnation accounts such that she was able to draw them. This drawing represents the brilliant star-sun of Rha – the supreme deity.

The Two Supplements

From the extrasensory side there was a wish that more information concerning religious and ethical issues would be known by mankind, and therefore the discarnated youngest tried to cause questions in these areas in the minds of some of those that had read and accepted Toward the Light! Then also these questions were responded to from the extrasensory side and published in two supplements in 1929 and 1930, respectively. Persons with a particularly refined linguistic ear will be able to tell that the style and manner of language in the supplements differs slightly from the one in Toward the Light! and this is because the responses in the supplements were transmitted to Johanne Agerskov in a slightly different way than was the case with Toward the Light! In the case of TtL the youngest stood by Johanne Agerskov’s side and provided her the responses in Danish word by word as a thought inspiration, and Mrs Agerskov’s psychic brain transmitted the words to her physical brain. When the responses for the supplements were to be provided, Leo was not by his daughter’s side but could rather be anywhere in the universe, but he had a kind of radio-phonic connection with her, and the responses to the questions were transmitted to her in “spiritual language”, and this had to be translated into Danish in Johanne Agerskov’s psychic brain and after that transmitted to her physical brain. This is why the answers in the supplements to a higher degree than in Toward the Light! have been rendered in the medium’s own linguistic manner, and that is noticeable from time to time. But according to the extrasensory spirits all the answers have been reproduced to their full satisfaction!

Even though the Danish priests and bishops did not show any signs of a reaction, the youngest still continued to maintain the line of contact with Johanne Agerskov open in order to help her, if necessary, to respond to questions and comments to the work and defend Toward the Light! against possible attacks in the media. Unfortunately Michael Agerskov fell seriously ill from a muscle disorder, and by the end of the 1920s and the beginning of the 1930s he became increasingly weak and finally had to be nursed in bed permanently. This lead to great strain for Johanne Agerskov and the daughter Inger, and for some time it seems that Mrs Agerskov regards her career as medium for the extrasensory world as terminated. However, a year after Mr Agerskov’s death (1933), caused by paralysis also of the heart muscle, she resumes responding to questions and comments.

Some of Johanne Agerskov’s responses by letter have also been collected and published in Johanne Agerskov’s “Copy Books 1-4”, and also these responses in many cases contain important information about the extrasensory truths; however, not all the letters have been dictated from extrasensory side but have been written by Mrs Agerskov by means of inspiration, or entirely by herself, and hence in some cases they must be assessed as a somewhat more uncertain source than Toward the Light! and the works directly linked to that one.

By means of these works, the extrasensory spirits – with good assistance from their earthly helpers – have lifted a corner of the veil of secrecy which has hidden the spiritual world to mankind. And with this work they have all ensured that the old Bible verse may become reality also when it comes to the great enigmas in life around which mankind has been pondering for thousands of years: “He that seeks shall find!”

May many people become aware, in the near future, of the treasure given to us in Toward the Light!

Oslo, March 6, 2010
Sverre Avnskog

English translation by
Jørgen Malling Christensen