A Course in Miracles
Encyclopedia
A Course in Miracles is a self-study curriculum that aims to assist its readers in achieving spiritual transformation. The book describes a non-dualistic philosophy of forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness is typically defined as the process of concluding resentment, indignation or anger as a result of a perceived offense, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution. The Oxford English Dictionary defines forgiveness as 'to grant free pardon and to give up all...

 and includes what are meant to be practical lessons and applications for the practice of forgiveness in one's daily life. The introduction to the book contains the following summary, "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God."

No author is listed for the book, but Helen Schucman
Helen Schucman
Helen Schucman was an American clinical and research psychologist from New York City. She was a professor of medical psychology at Columbia University in New York from 1958 until her retirement in 1976...

 wrote it with the help of William Thetford
William Thetford
William Thetford was trained as a psychologist and remained professionally active in this field throughout his life. Thetford worked in a collaborative venture with Helen Schucman in writing and providing some of the initial edits for A Course In Miracles , a self-study curriculum...

, based on what she called an "inner voice" which she identified as Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...

. The 1992 edition, the most recent copyrighted one, is published by the Foundation for Inner Peace (FIP), the organization chosen by Schucman for this purpose. It consists of preface, text, workbook for students, manual for teachers (including clarification of terms), and two supplements. Kenneth Wapnick and Foundation for A Course in Miracles (FACIM) were awarded the copyright to this edition after the original copyright was overturned. This edited version earned copyright status since it derives from the original manuscript as edited by Wapnick. FIP reports that two million volumes of ACIM have been published and disseminated worldwide since it first became available for sale in 1976. Additionally, the book has been translated into nineteen different languages with eight new translations underway.

An online edition of ACIM is published by the A Course in Miracles Society. It consists of foreword, introduction, text, workbook for students, and manual for teachers. This manuscript was retyped three times by William Thetford and Helen Schucman. They divided the text into chapters and sections, gave titles to each, and removed a great deal of material from the early chapters because they believed that material was meant for them personally, not for the Course.

Overview of origins

A Course in Miracles was originally written in a collaborative venture by Schucman and Thetford. In the beginning, the voice (which Schucman claimed to have identified itself earlier to her as Jesus) described them as scribes.

In 1976, A Course in Miracles was published and distributed as a three-volume set—which had evolved from the original notes—and comprised three books: Text, Workbook for Students, and Manual for Teachers.

During the first 19 years of its circulation, A Course in Miracles was published, printed and distributed directly by the students of the work. In 1995, the printing and distribution of the work was licensed to Penguin Books
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

 for five years.

Editors

When Schucman experienced some personal difficulties and hesitance after hearing the voice, Bill Thetford, her work supervisor and friend, contacted Hugh Lynn Cayce (son of the celebrity psychic Edgar Cayce
Edgar Cayce
Edgar Cayce was an American psychic who allegedly had the ability to give answers to questions on subjects such as healing or Atlantis while in a hypnotic trance...

) at his Association for Research and Enlightenment
Association for Research and Enlightenment
The Association for Research and Enlightenment , also known as Edgar Cayce's A.R.E., was founded by Edgar Cayce in 1931 to research and explore subjects such as holistic health, ancient mysteries, personal spirituality, dreams and dream interpretation, intuition, philosophy and reincarnation...

 in Virginia Beach, Virginia
Virginia Beach, Virginia
Virginia Beach is an independent city located in the Hampton Roads metropolitan area of Virginia, on the Atlantic Ocean at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay...

 to seek his advice and counsel. Shucman later met with Cayce before she began to record the Course.

Kenneth Wapnick was a clinical psychologist who directed a school for disturbed children and served as chief psychologist at Harlem Valley State Hospital
Harlem Valley State Hospital
Harlem Valley State Hospital, south of the hamlet of Wingdale in the Town of Dover, was a New York State psychiatric hospital that operated from 1924-1994....

 from 1967 through 1972. In 1972, Wapnick left his Jewish faith and converted to Catholicism
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....

 so he could become a monk..

Fr. Benedict Groeschel
Benedict Groeschel
Benedict Joseph Groeschel, CFR is a Catholic priest, retreat master, author, psychologist, activist and host of the television talk program Sunday Night Prime with Father Benedict Groeschel, which is broadcast on the Eternal Word Television Network. He has also hosted several serial religious...

 was a priest with a doctorate in psychology and a member of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin
Order of Friars Minor Capuchin
The Order of Friars Minor Capuchin is an Order of friars in the Catholic Church, among the chief offshoots of the Franciscans. The worldwide head of the Order, called the Minister General, is currently Father Mauro Jöhri.-Origins :...

 who studied under Thetford and worked with Schucman. Groeschel arranged an introduction of Wapnick to Schucman and Thetford in November 1972. Groeschel was given a copy of the ACIM manuscript in 1973, and testified that he was instructed by Schucman not to distribute the manuscript; however, with Schucman's permission, he made it available to Wapnick.

Wapnick reviewed the draft and discussed with Schucman further revisions that were needed to place the book in final form. Over the next thirteen months, Wapnick and Schucman edited the manuscript by deleting personal material intended only for Schucman and Thetford, creating chapter and section headings, and correcting various inconsistencies in paragraph structure, punctuation, and capitalization. This editing process was completed by approximately February 1975. Wapnick subsequently became a teacher of the Course, co-founder and president of the Foundation for A Course in Miracles (FACIM), and a director and executive committee member of the Foundation for Inner Peace (FIP).

Distribution

The Foundation for Inner Peace (or FIP) was originally called the Foundation for Para-Sensory Investigations, Inc. (FPI)., and was founded on October 21, 1971 by Robert Skutch and Judith Skutch Whitson. Robert Skutch and Judith Skutch Whitson were married at the time of its inception, and have since become directors. Robert Skutch was a businessman and writer, who for many years had been a writer of television plays and advertising copy. Judith Skutch Whitson was a teacher and lecturer at New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

 on the science of the study of consciousness
Consciousness
Consciousness is a term that refers to the relationship between the mind and the world with which it interacts. It has been defined as: subjectivity, awareness, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood, and the executive control system of the mind...

 and parapsychology
Parapsychology
The term parapsychology was coined in or around 1889 by philosopher Max Dessoir, and originates from para meaning "alongside", and psychology. The term was adopted by J.B. Rhine in the 1930s as a replacement for the term psychical research...

. On May 29, 1975, Douglas Dean, a physicist engineer, introduced Schucman, Thetford, and Wapnick to Judith Skutch Whitson. Soon thereafter, they introduced her to the Course and the four of them met regularly to study, discuss, and share their common enthusiasm for it. At some point in 1975, Schucman appears to have authorized Skutch Whitson and Ken Wapnick to initiate the process of copyrighting ACIM and to assume responsibility themselves for the resulting copyright.

In mid-July 1975, Skutch Whitson met briefly with her doctoral adviser, Eleanor Criswell, who had a small printing company called Freeperson's Press. Criswell advised Skutch Whitson that she would be willing to assist in having the manuscript published and took responsibility for the manuscript pages, and in August 1975, they were taken to a Kopy Kat copy center in Berkeley
Berkeley, California
Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...

, to be reproduced. In August 1975, Skutch Whitson organized a reception at 2000 Broadway, San Francisco
San Francisco, California
San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...

, where Schucman and Thetford were introduced to a number of people. During this time period, a number of copies were distributed—hundreds according to Skutch Whitson and Skutch. The first edition of 100 copies of the Criswell edition was bound with a yellow cover and a copyright notice. Robert Skutch filed the copyright for ACIM for FIP on November 24, 1975, swearing to a date of first publication as October 6, 1975, in the form of the Freeperson Press edition. Zelda Suplee, director of the Erickson Educational Foundation, a friend of Skutch Whitson, was given a copy of the uncopyrighted manuscript by Skutch Whitson prior to the publication of the Criswell edition. In 1976, Reed Erickson
Reed Erickson
Reed Erickson was a transsexual man best known for his philanthropy.In 1964 he launched the Erickson Educational Foundation , a nonprofit philanthropic organization funded and controlled entirely by Erickson himself...

, a wealthy transsexual philanthropist, received a copy of the manuscript, which he used as a basis for study by a group in Mexico. Erickson was the primary financial backer of the first hard-bound edition of the Course, donating $440,000 for this printing. Later that year the FIP began to publish the Course in a set of three hardcover volumes. Five years later, in 1981, Schucman died of complications related to pancreatic cancer.

In 1983, control of the copyright was transferred to the FACIM as headed by Wapnick.

In 1985, the FIP began publishing the three volumes in a more manageable, single soft-cover volume, but without any editorial content changes.

In 1992, the FIP published a second hardcover edition, which contained some editorial content additions and minor changes. Amongst these changes were the addition of a verse-numbering system. It was Schucman's desire that a non-profit foundation publish the work.

In 1995, FIP entered a five-year printing and distribution agreement, which expired in December 2000, with Penguin Books
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

 for $2.5 million. Currently some copies of some of the earlier draft versions of the book (which may or may not be complete, unadulterated or legal) are available both online and through private publishers.

Copyright litigation

Beginning in June, 1996, and ending in April, 2004, a copyright lawsuit initiated by Penguin Books and FIP was brought against the Church of the Full Endeavor
Endeavor Academy
Endeavor Academy, founded in 1992 as the New Christian Church of Full Endeavor, is a community of students of the late Charles Buell Anderson, which focuses primarily on the teachings found in the book; A Course in Miracles...

 for their unlimited independent publication of substantial portions of A Course in Miracles. It was found that the contents of the FIP first edition, published from 1976 through 1992, are in the public domain. However, copyright in all of the changes introduced in the Second Edition remains intact, as does the copyright for the Text Preface, "Clarification of Terms" found at the end of the Manual for Teachers, and the two supplementary pamphlets, Psychotherapy and Song of Prayer, as well as Schucman's poetry, The Gifts of God. The Urtext
Urtext edition
An urtext edition of a work of classical music is a printed version intended to reproduce the original intention of the composer as exactly as possible, without any added or changed material...

 manuscript of A Course in Miracles, which has been widely published on the internet, was obtained deceptively under false pretenses. This material is under separate copyright and all duplications and versions of this copy are in violation of its copyright protection.

Post litigation editions

Since the release of the original copyright, which previously protected substantial portions of the earlier Schucman-ACIM material, various individuals, groups, and group members have worked to study and publish various versions and interpretations of this earlier material. Most notable are the Course in Miracles Society (CIMS), headed by Tom Whitmore, and various initiatives by members of Endeavor Academy, which was founded by the late Charles Buell Anderson
Charles Buell Anderson
Charles Buell Anderson was the founder of the Endeavor Academy, a religious community with its headquarters in Wisconsin, United States. Prior to founding Endeavor Academy in 1992, Anderson was a real estate salesman. Anderson also served in the US Marines in the 1940's. ...

.

Reception

Since it first became available for sale in 1976, over 2 million copies of A Course in Miracles have been sold worldwide and the text has been translated into sixteen different languages. A Course In Miracles (ACIM) is widely distributed globally, forming the basis of a range of organised groups. The teachings of A Course in Miracles have been supported by commentators and authors such as Eckhart Tolle
Eckhart Tolle
Eckhart Tolle is a German-born Canadian resident, best known as the author of the The Power of Now and A New Earth, which were written in English. In 2011, he was listed by the Watkins Review as the most spiritually influential person in the world...

.
However, due to ACIM's claims to "clarify" or even supersede
some of the teachings of orthodox Christianity, the book has been judged negatively by some Christians.

Although a friend of Schucman, Thetford, and Wapnik, Benedict J. Groeschel
Benedict Groeschel
Benedict Joseph Groeschel, CFR is a Catholic priest, retreat master, author, psychologist, activist and host of the television talk program Sunday Night Prime with Father Benedict Groeschel, which is broadcast on the Eternal Word Television Network. He has also hosted several serial religious...

 has since criticized ACIM and the related organizations. Finding some elements of the Course to be what he called, "severe and potentially dangerous distortions of Christian theology", he wrote that the Course is “a good example of a false revelation” and that “it has . . . become a spiritual menace to many.”

Other Christian authors, such as evangelical Bob Larson
Bob Larson
Bob Larson is an American radio and television evangelist, currently based in Scottsdale, Arizona. Larson has authored numerous books on the subjects of rock music and Satanism, written from a Christian perspective.-Life and career:...

, have similarly criticized A Course In Miracles, saying it contradicts basic tenets of Christianity, twisting its core teachings and "deceiving people who are sincerely looking for God." Larson also criticizes ACIM popularizer Marianne Williamson
Marianne Williamson
Marianne Williamson is a spiritual activist, author, lecturer and founder of The Peace Alliance, a grass roots campaign supporting legislation currently before Congress to establish a United States Department of Peace. She is also the founder of Project Angel Food, a meals-on-wheels program that...

 personally, saying that her work on behalf of ACIM denies "essential qualities of faith" such as guilt and forgiveness, and necessitates the Biblically forbidden practice of transpossession mediumship
Mediumship
Mediumship is described as a form of communication with spirits. It is a practice in religious beliefs such as Spiritualism, Spiritism, Espiritismo, Candomblé, Voodoo and Umbanda.- Concept :...

.

Evangelical editor Elliot Miller says that Christian terminology employed in ACIM is "thoroughly redefined" to resemble New Age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...

 teachings. Other Christian critics say ACIM is "intensely anti-Biblical" and incompatible with Christianity, blurring the distinction between creator and created and forcefully supporting the occult
Occult
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus , referring to "knowledge of the hidden". In the medical sense it is used to refer to a structure or process that is hidden, e.g...

and New Age world view.

Theologian Anton van Harskamp notes that the metaphysics of A Course in Miracles is inconsistent with that of Christianity in that its “story of creation is totally different from the Christian one.” Accordingly to van Harskamp, in looking at "the suffering in the world, 'the Course' says that this world cannot be created by a God.” In the Christian conception “creation is good” “but at the same time it is impossible to say this about everything that exists.”

Skeptic Robert T. Carroll criticizes ACIM as "a minor industry" that is overly commercialized and characterizes it as "Christianity improved", saying its teachings are not original and suggesting they are culled from "various sources, east and west".

Despite the high level of criticism that ACIM has received from many Christian theologians and authors, other theologians, both Catholics and Protestants, including Evangelicals, have given ACIM high marks and "glowing endorsements".
In summary, ACIM's reception among Christian theologians has been quite mixed and has been by no means uniform or monolithic. This anticipated "conflict" is even referred to in the Course's Introduction to Clarification of Terms. "They must, however, be willing to overlook controversy, recognizing that it is a defense against truth in the form of a delaying maneuver. Theological considerations as such are necessarily controversial, since they depend on belief and can therefore be accepted or rejected. A universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible but necessary. It is this experience toward which the course is directed."

External links

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