The Disappearance of the Universe

The Disappearance of the Universe is a book written by Gary Renard and originally published by Fearless Books (2003), and later by Hay House (2004).^[1][2]

This book records seventeen contacts between Renard and two Ascended Masters whose last lifetime was in our future, named Arten and Pursah^[3], over the course of nine years beginning in 1992. The recordings were later destroyed. It reflects the teachings of A Course in Miracles. A sequel called Your Immortal Reality appeared in 2006. In a podcast around late 2006 or early 2007 Renard indicated he had been visited once again, intimating a third book would follow focused on the subject of love.

About the author

Gary R. Renard, the author, was born in Massachusetts in the United States and worked there as a professional guitar player. During the Harmonic Convergence of 1987 he heard a calling and began to take his life in a different direction. At the beginning of the 1990s he moved to Maine, where he claims he underwent a powerful spiritual awakening.^[4]

Promotion and sales

The book sales at one time ranked in Amazon.com's #2 slot, second only to Harry Potter.^[5] Bestselling author Wayne Dyer endorsed the book, stating that it is "destined to be one of the most significant contributions to spiritual literature in this century."^[6]

Message

The Disappearance of the Universe is a mix of commentary narrative and edited dialog transcripts over Pursah and Arten's reported appearances to Renard. Endorsing the Course in Miracles teaching, it claims to elucidate the latter's teaching that categoric forgiveness is the key to ontological understanding and escape of a birth-death-reincarnation cycle^[7]. Like earlier teachings such as Christian Science DU inculcates that the world is fundamentally an illusion of human ego outside, as it were, of an unbroken perfect spiritual reality in unity with God. Rather than stressing understanding as such as the tool to return or put off the illusion, however, DU stresses forgiveness itself as the critical linchpin, based on the idea that all human identities are really one, divided only by a belief in separation, and that all sin and wrong is an outward projection of a subconscious inward guilt at having "left" perfection in sin against God^[8]. To forgive others from this basis is therefore actually to forgive oneself, undo the ego and its seeming separation, achieve atonement, and put off an unreal universe. Unlike some similar teachings, it argues all individuated human identity is also illusory^[9].

Most of the content revolves around the detail and practice of this teaching, combined with Renard's response to it in friendly casual dialog, but during the course of which Arten and Pursah also touch on related matter such as Gnosticism, biblical texts and the Q document, celibacy, sex, the virgin birth^[10], Mary Magdalene^[11], and the details of Jesus' life, the Holy Spirit, the Gospel of Thomas and its 3-verse missing apocryphon^[12], Paul of Tarsus and Christian church history, Buddhism, Sigmund Freud and Georg Groddeck, the panspermia theory, the Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare's identity^[13], Mary Baker Eddy, the 2000 U.S. Presidential election, Stanislav Petrov's probable aversion of nuclear holocaust^[14], and reincarnation, time and metaphysics, though Arten and Pursah contend the earthly details they discuss are illustrative but potential distractions to their primary ontological focus. Worth note in passing is also the claim that his visitors instantly teleported Renard a distance of some 30 miles to illustrate a point of their discussion, a paranormality of the same order as their instant materialization on and disappearance from his couch during the course of their visits, and that Thomas the Apostle was a Renard past life and Pursah his next and final future human identity^[15].

Reviews

The Disappearance of the Universe has been received with reviewer reactions ranging from great scorn and disbelief to predictions of one day becoming a "spiritual classic". Some reviewers regard it as a hoax on both stylistic and factual grounds,^[16][17] such as for its non-mainstream claim that human beings migrated to earth from Mars; and to Mars from elsewhere before that.^[18]

External links

• garyrenard.com

References

1. ^ Gary Renard (May 2003). The Disappearance of the Universe. Berkeley CA: Hay House. ISBN 0-9656809-5-9. http://www.hayhouse.com/details.php?id=2244. Retrieved 29 June 2006. 
2. ^ D. Patrick Miller. "Fearless Literary Consultations". Fearless Books. http://www.fearlessbooks.com/Consultations.html. Retrieved 29 June 2006. 
3. ^ Excerpts from The Disappearance of the Universe
4. ^ "Authors - Gary R. Renard". Hay House, Inc.. 2004. http://www.hayhouse.com/authorbio.php?id=315. Retrieved 29 June 2006. 
5. ^ Garrett, Lynn (7 March 2005). "'Disappearance' Appears Big Time". Publisher's Weekly. http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA508787.html?text=the+disappearance+of+the+universe. Retrieved 29 June 2006. ^{[dead link]}
6. ^ Gary Renard Official Web site
7. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.87, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
8. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.88, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
9. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.102, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
10. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.54, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
11. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.361, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
12. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.73, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
13. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.330, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
14. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.371, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
15. ^ Renard, Gary. Disappearance of the Universe (2005) p.405, Hay House Edition, ISBN 1401905668
16. ^ Articles on A Course in Miracles: Entities Should Not Be Multiplied Beyond Necessity
17. ^ Articles on A Course in Miracles: Why Don't the Masters Have an Original Thought?
18. ^ The Disappearance of the Universe, page 342