A Course in Miracles Commentary by
Allen Watson

1. The role of teaching and learning is actually reversed in the thinking of the world. ²The reversal is characteristic. ³It seems as if the teacher and the learner are separated, the teacher giving something to the learner rather than to himself. ⁴Further, the act of teaching is regarded as a special activity, in which one engages only a relatively small proportion of one’s time. ⁵The course, on the other hand, emphasizes that to teach is to learn, so that teacher and learner are the same. ⁶It also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day, and continues into sleeping thoughts as well.

2. To teach is to demonstrate. ²There are only two thought systems, and you demonstrate that you believe one or the other is true all the time. ³From your demonstration others learn, and so do you. ⁴The question is not whether you will teach, for in that there is no choice. ⁵The purpose of the course might be said to provide you with a means of choosing what you want to teach on the basis of what you want to learn. ⁶You cannot give to someone else, but only to yourself, and this you learn through teaching. ⁷Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe. ⁸It is a method of conversion. ⁹This is not done by words alone. ¹⁰Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. ¹¹No more than that, but also never less.

3. The curriculum you set up is therefore determined exclusively by what you think you are, and what you believe the relationship of others is to you. ²In the formal teaching situation, these questions may be totally unrelated to what you think you are teaching. ³Yet it is impossible not to use the content of any situation on behalf of what you really teach, and therefore really learn. ⁴To this the verbal content of your teaching is quite irrelevant. ⁵It may coincide with it, or it may not. ⁶It is the teaching underlying what you say that teaches you. ⁷Teaching but reinforces what you believe about yourself. ⁸Its fundamental purpose is to diminish self-doubt. ⁹This does not mean that the self you are trying to protect is real. ¹⁰But it does mean that the self you think is real is what you teach.

4. This is inevitable. ²There is no escape from it. ³How could it be otherwise? ⁴Everyone who follows the world’s curriculum, and everyone here does follow it until he changes his mind, teaches solely to convince himself that he is what he is not. ⁵Herein is the purpose of the world. ⁶What else, then, would its curriculum be? ⁷Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers. ⁸And as they teach His lessons of joy and hope, their learning finally becomes complete.

5. Except for God’s teachers there would be little hope of salvation, for the world of sin would seem forever real. ²The self-deceiving must deceive, for they must teach deception. ³And what else is hell? ⁴This is a manual for the teachers of God. ⁵They are not perfect, or they would not be here. ⁶Yet it is their mission to become perfect here, and so they teach perfection over and over, in many, many ways, until they have learned it. ⁷And then they are seen no more, although their thoughts remain a source of strength and truth forever. ⁸Who are they? ⁹How are they chosen? ¹⁰What do they do? ¹¹How can they work out their own salvation and the salvation of the world? ¹²This manual attempts to answer these questions.

1. The role of teaching and learning is actually reversed in the thinking of the world. ²The reversal is characteristic. ³It seems as if the teacher and the learner are separated, the teacher giving something to the learner rather than to himself. ⁴Further, the act of teaching is regarded as a special activity, in which one engages only a relatively small proportion of one’s time. ⁵The course, on the other hand, emphasizes that to teach is to learn, so that teacher and learner are the same. ⁶It also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day, and continues into sleeping thoughts as well.

2. To teach is to demonstrate. ²There are only two thought systems, and you demonstrate that you believe one or the other is true all the time. ³From your demonstration others learn, and so do you. ⁴The question is not whether you will teach, for in that there is no choice. ⁵The purpose of the course might be said to provide you with a means of choosing what you want to teach on the basis of what you want to learn. ⁶You cannot give to someone else, but only to yourself, and this you learn through teaching. ⁷Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe. ⁸It is a method of conversion. ⁹This is not done by words alone. ¹⁰Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. ¹¹No more than that, but also never less.

3. The curriculum you set up is therefore determined exclusively by what you think you are, and what you believe the relationship of others is to you. ²In the formal teaching situation, these questions may be totally unrelated to what you think you are teaching. ³Yet it is impossible not to use the content of any situation on behalf of what you really teach, and therefore really learn. ⁴To this the verbal content of your teaching is quite irrelevant. ⁵It may coincide with it, or it may not. ⁶It is the teaching underlying what you say that teaches you. ⁷Teaching but reinforces what you believe about yourself. ⁸Its fundamental purpose is to diminish self-doubt. ⁹This does not mean that the self you are trying to protect is real. ¹⁰But it does mean that the self you think is real is what you teach.

4. This is inevitable. ²There is no escape from it. ³How could it be otherwise? ⁴Everyone who follows the world’s curriculum, and everyone here does follow it until he changes his mind, teaches solely to convince himself that he is what he is not. ⁵Herein is the purpose of the world. ⁶What else, then, would its curriculum be? ⁷Into this hopeless and closed learning situation, which teaches nothing but despair and death, God sends His teachers. ⁸And as they teach His lessons of joy and hope, their learning finally becomes complete.

5. Except for God’s teachers there would be little hope of salvation, for the world of sin would seem forever real. ²The self-deceiving must deceive, for they must teach deception. ³And what else is hell? ⁴This is a manual for the teachers of God. ⁵They are not perfect, or they would not be here. ⁶Yet it is their mission to become perfect here, and so they teach perfection over and over, in many, many ways, until they have learned it. ⁷And then they are seen no more, although their thoughts remain a source of strength and truth forever. ⁸Who are they? ⁹How are they chosen? ¹⁰What do they do? ¹¹How can they work out their own salvation and the salvation of the world? ¹²This manual attempts to answer these questions.