Matthew 17:21 · World English Bible
Matthew 17:21 Meaning But This Kind Doesn’t Go Out Except
But this kind doesn’t go out except by prayer and fasting.
What does Matthew 17:21 mean?
The stubborn kind that will not leave is a fixed disturbance of the lower mind, and it goes out by 2 inward acts. Fasting here has nothing to do with the mouth or with starving the body: it is the refusal to swallow the thoughts that come up from the lower mind, keeping the fearful and intrusive ones from being taken in at all.
From the Esoteric reading below.
Matthew 17:21 through 1 lens
The same verse, read by one tradition.
Esoteric
ESOTERIC
Esoteric
The stubborn kind that will not leave is a fixed disturbance of the lower mind, and it goes out by 2 inward acts. Fasting here has nothing to do with the mouth or with starving the body: it is the refusal to swallow the thoughts that come up from the lower mind, keeping the fearful and intrusive ones from being taken in at all. Prayer is focused energy, attention gathered and concentrated until the electrons are excited and the photons dispatched, the light sent out from within.
The hardest inner cases yield only to this pair: shutting the door on the lower thoughts, and turning concentrated energy toward the higher, until the disturbance loosens and is gone.
Fasting: the refusal to take in the thoughts rising from the lower mind, not any abstaining from food Prayer: attention gathered and concentrated into focused energy, electrons excited so the light goes out
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Live Matthew 17:21 today
- The next anxious thought that arrives today, do not argue with it and do not follow it. Just let it stand there unfed and go on with what you were doing.
- When a group chat or a comment section starts pulling you into outrage, put the phone down without replying. You do not have to take in every mood that comes at you.
- Under real pressure, give yourself five minutes with the phone off and your attention on one thing only, your breath or your hands or the view out the window. Gathered attention loosens what fighting makes tighter.
Which thought have you been swallowing all week as though you had no choice?
The same truth in other traditions
Buddhism · Dhammapada
You are not required to believe every thought that shows up. Watch them come and go, and stop feeding the ones that are eating you.
Stoicism · Epictetus
When a troubling impression arrives, do not swallow it whole. Hold it at arm's length, test it, and refuse to call it true just because it came with force.
Hinduism · Patanjali's Yoga Sutras
Stillness comes from gathering the scattered mind into one point. Attention collected is the whole practice, and the restless thoughts quiet as it holds.
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