Based On The Original Handwritten Notes Of Helen Schucman--Complete & Annotated Edition

Overall, pretty great. I was disappointed in paper quality, I don't think this will last like my old one. And I was surprised to find much added but a couple of things I want had dropped off. I am enjoying some of the rewording. Makes a good companion for my older book.

The wonderful cameos you’ll find in it would be enough justify your purchase of the Circle of Atonement’s new Complete Edition of the Course all by themselves. They shed a wholly new light on what was going on for Helen and Bill while the Course was coming through. They’re engaging, touching, absolutely fascinating. But the cameos are not only fascinating. Importantly, they are inspiring and deeply instructive too. In fact, they’re just wonderful.

Oh, and I also need to mention the footnotes you’ll find throughout this new edition. There are a lot of footnotes. Often, I’ll be honest, my heart sinks when I see lots of footnotes in a text. They can feel like hard work - a bit of a scholarly distraction. But not here! This is because the footnotes in the new Complete Edition are an incredibly practical aid to understanding. I thought I already knew the Course well, having been reading it for over 20 years. However, these footnotes are serving to deepen and enrich my understanding of every page. Frankly, now I’ve discovered their value, I don’t know how I ever managed without them.

For anyone who already loves the Course - or for anyone who’s merely curious and who maybe simply wants to find out just a little bit more about this modern spiritual masterpiece - I cannot recommend the Circle’s new Complete Edition highly enough.

If you are already a Course In Miracles student, you owe it to yourself to buy the "Circle Edition" of the Course. I would make the same recommendation to anyone who identifies themselves as a member of the Christian faith, and belongs to that very large group of people who have sat in a pew on a Sunday morning, saying to themselves, "There must be something more to this ." In the Circle Edition of A Course in Miracles, you will find a very personal, unfathomably loving Jesus, who is actively guiding humanity towards salvation, and will actively guide each personal life toward same if given permission. You will find a Jesus who encourages us to live as he did two thousand years ago; unconditionally loving all, offering healing and succor to all, and extending every day miracles to all. Within these pages will be found confirmation of an infinitely loving Creator God who knows us all as his children, and guides each of us gently to the final recognition of our oneness with him and with one another. If you could only read one book in a lifetime, this would be the one I would recommend. Everything truly worth knowing can be found here.

My experience with the previous edition of A Course in Miracles was a quite the journey over several years. Every time I would read it I was confused, the material seemed obtuse and hard to grasp. I found myself reading it but not really understanding it. It was not inviting to journey with as a program or a spiritual path. Too much was left up to me to try to understand, too much Course lore emerged with an this absence of understanding. Several Course authors, Williamson, Jampolsky, others, emerged to assist us in deciphering the Course. For me i wanted to understand the source code itself.
This new Completed and Annotated Edition (CE) led me on a new journey with the Course. Whereas before, my learning was like a series of unconnected trails, the CE offers me a well-paved path of understanding. My daily reading has turned from a daunting task to an energetic movement. With the CE edition, you will understand the Course as never before. There is a massive story depth of Helen and Bill’s journey included in the CE that had been edited out in previous editions. To experience the Course through their eyes and Jesus’ ever-present guidance makes it real for me. Added to the new material is Robert Perry and Greg Mackie’s Course scholarship. Their work spanning several decades helps me connect concept with application. Their interpretation gives me a new understanding of how I live out the Course in my thoughts and behaviors.
Robert and Greg your commitment to the fidelity of the Course is on display and furthers Jesus’ mission for each of us to take part in the salvation of the world. It couldn’t have come at a better moment for mankind, thank you.
The CE helped me crack the code; it was always there I just couldn’t find it!

To all students of A Course in Miracles - new and tenured students - make sure you read Doctor Bob's review below. It is long but well worth the read. I have been a student of ACIM for over twenty years and have used material from both Foundation for Inner Peace and from Circle of Atonement. I love both organizations and both have been instrumental to my understanding, passion and commitment to the Course's path. I had tears in my eyes as I see both organizations through Doctor Bob (FIP) and Robert Perry (Circle of Atonement) giving fair, scholarly, and loving comments to both editions. The Course community has long needed this reconciliation and expressions of what the Course teaches with love and forgiveness. My sincerest thanks to both Roberts for their respect of the other in sharing their thoughts and ideas.
I happen to agree with Robert Rosenthal's (Doctor Bob) review that this new edition is best suited for longer time students of the Course. It is an extremely helpful addition to my own study now but I read both each day. I love the FIP's version for its fluidity and lack of footnotes which, as Robert Rosenthal points out, detracts because I can't help reading them. So for me I prefer the FIP version for meditation, spiritual connectedness, and allowing Spirit to speak to me more personally. I use and like this new edition for study and expanding my deeper understanding of the contexts and teachings of the Course. Both have a place in my life and each performs a different need for me in my work with the Course. Most of the material I had read previously from the Circle of Atonement's writings and sharing. But having it now consolidated in this edition is a wonderful gift.
Again, I think Robert Rosenthal and Robert Perry for their gifts to the Course's special message. And I thank them again for embodying the teachings of the Course in how they are speaking to one another and therefore to all of us.

Beautiful and meticulously edited. The definitive edition of this spiritual classic. Replete with insightful explanatory footnotes, including identification of many biblical references. The product of years of study and assimilation of this Teaching by the editors.

Yes, there are 50% more pages. Part of that is restored material not included in previous editions. Part is the footnotes. And part - more space on the page, MORE READABLE, less crowding of the lines. ("Psychotherapy" and "Song of Prayer" supplements are not included.)

Here is one detail that illustrates the sensitivity: the prayers that appear every day in Part II of the Workbook -- they are all laid out in lines of iambic pentameter, as they were written! The block prose of past editions tended to hide the 'music'.

The original notes were much more psychologically sophisticated and far-ranging than the FIP edition led on (however much I deeply appreciate that edition, and always will). References to karma, the soul, the spiritual eye, "elder brothers," and at least one sentence apparently paraphrased from the Bhagavad-Gita finally liberate a broader, theosophical significance to this 'course in Christian yoga,' which a few of us have always suspected was there.

If the FIP version had the Course's basic tenets, this new CE edition fills in all the blanks. My understanding of ACIM has increased manyfold, thanks to the newly included material, careful annotating and footnoting, Biblical and literary references, and background-providing cameo pieces, I can understand why the original editions had some personal material for Helen and Bill edited out, but much of the material that has been put back in paints a fuller, more complete picture of how the average student can relate to one another and to the Course. Kudos to Robert and Greg and their dedicated team for a monumental work of love. If you enjoyed the FIP version, do stay with it. But if you want an expansive version that captures the essence of the Course and its scribes, along with valuable new insights, you will absolutely love the Complete and Annotated Edition.

The breadth of this edition is staggering to me, it's like the ceiling has been taken off this already magnificent work.The foot notes add so much, they offer: relevant reference points, flesh out meaning, give Biblical references, cite the relevancy to Helen and Bill's lives, provides definitions, and give related text references. Then the cameos - oh my! They are fascinating, and provide such a breadth of understanding to the text. There are times when the information feels precious. I feel like I'm walking in sacred territory. How it's all been put together is astonishing, it's is gift to any Course student reading it.

I am enthralled with the new version of ACIM! Robert Perry's introductory summation of the Course and comparison of the Course’s Voice to the Voice of the historical Jesus re-inspired me in so many ways. What a huge but clearly guided and magnificent undertaking this was. Thank you, Robert Perry and the staff at The Circle of Atonement. You have shined light and hope into an otherwise dreary January 2017.

Nothing is as it seems. From the following quotes, taken from a previous five-star the store Review of The Complete and Annotated Edition of A Course in Miracles by "Doctor Bob", it would seem that there were unscrupulous people who, for perhaps selfish reasons, wished to cause dissension and division within the Course Community.
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"This was the situation that prevailed for over twenty years. Then, sometime in the late 1990s, the Cayce draft was removed from the A.R.E. library without permission, photocopied and circulated. (Charles Thomas Cayce, unaware of the promise made by his father to Bill and Helen, had moved it from the vault to a locked, private room.) The Cayce draft was eventually published without permission under the title “Jesus’s A Course in Miracles” and later as “ACIM-Original Edition.” In addition, Helen’s notebooks and the earliest complete draft of the Course (known as the Urtext) were illegally removed from the Library of Congress, copied, and posted online."

"This proliferation of Courses is confusing to say the least. But it has had far more serious consequences. It has led to schisms and factionalism among a community ostensibly devoted to the practice of love and forgiveness. I have no doubt that those who stole and made public Helen’s notes and the two earlier drafts saw themselves not as thieves, but as liberators. Yet these actions were divisive because they have sown division."
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And yet, what if we were to shift the way we look at this situation and instead look with the “eyes of Christ” --- In other words, what if we were to ask for a Miracle.

Perhaps there were a group of people who loved the Course very dearly and wanted to learn everything they could about the scribe’s relationship with Jesus. After they read material in Ken Wapnick’s book, Absence of Felicity, they were inspired to learn all they could about the scribe and the material she had been given. However, this material was safely guarded and considered to be far too confusing for any new student.

In this the store Review and on their website, The Foundation for Inner Peace continues to call the Hugh Lynn Cayce manuscript, found in the A.R.E. Library, a Draft; but when it was shown to Ken Wapnick by the scribes, they had considered it complete. They had shown it to several people and expressed hopes that it might be published.

As soon as Ken Wapnick read it, he is quoted as saying that it was his opinion it needed considerable editing to be public-ready. As a note: Ken was not a long-time student. He had just recently read the Course.

What if there were another way of seeing this manuscript that the scribe and co-scribe had thought of as complete. What if it were known that the manuscript, prior to being shown to others, including Ken, had been re-typed several times, each time personal material, meant only for the scribes, was removed and only material that could be “generalized” was retained. What if it were known that it was not considered a draft until the meeting with Ken Wapnick.

Even if we were to consider it as a draft, can we shift our view of the early relationship between Helen and Bill and Jesus, which is represented by this draft, and see it as a perfectly orchestrated learning tool?

What if we were to see Helen’s and Bill’s relationship with Jesus as no different than our own relationship with Jesus. As Course students, can we see that their relationship with the VOICE for GOD was not a “special relationship” but a Holy one. Their interactions with the VOICE bless all of us and help us to join them on our shared journey Home.

When the scribe and co-scribe were first introduced to this material, they were neophytes. They weren’t long-time students, as many of us are now. What more perfect material could be offered to the beginning student than the gentle and loving relationship Helen and Bill had with Jesus?

And what if everything that came through Helen was perfectly orchestrated for our good, which includes all the early material [UrText, Special Messages, HLC, etc.]

This material was, by the way, copied from the Library of Congress, legally and with permission, by the litigants of the Court case brought against them. It is not well known, but when an entity is being sued, it has a legal right to all the material involved in the suit. [Although it was subsequently disseminated by someone outside of the Course case, this was done without the permission of those being sued.]

However, all things are gently planned by One Whose only purpose is our good. The Court Case that was brought to establish the copyright was perfect. The discovery phase, during which someone mentioned having seen a manuscript in the A.R.E. Library, was perfect. The dissemination of the material received because of the Court Case, was all perfect. The publication of the A Course in Miracles-Original Edition was perfect and the creation of a A Course in Miracles: Complete and Annotated Edition is perfect as well.

It’s almost as if it were orchestrated by Spirit. Now, we can use everything for our awakening.

And most importantly, we can use this seemingly divisive situation for healing. We can see all our brothers as sinless and guiltless, whole and complete.

As an outcome of all these editions, A Course in Miracles is now available in whatever format speaks to your heart. One is not right or better or more authorized than the other. They all work toward our Good.

All is well.
~ Rev Reja Joy Green
Course in Miracles Society

I started the Course twice using the FIP version and found it slow going, and eventually stopped it both times. Even with additional materials and commentaries, I wasn't enjoying it. This year I started again using the Complete and Expanded edition and am finding it to be a devotional gem. I actually have to pace myself to not read more than a chapter a week so I can spend time in reflection and contemplation. The Cameo's are amazing and generally capture my heart. I start a new chapter and a Cameo each Monday, and Monday's are quickly becoming my favorite day of the week. I am grateful that my heart is responding to the course, and I am grateful for this version. Blessings.

Bought book directly from CoA. This edition is a Miracle, countless ones truly. I often think of the line from somewhere in ACIM that we are brought to things when we are ready, or said another way, we are taken as far as we are ready to go. Thank you to everyone who had a part in creating this annotated edition, which is an important supplement to the original. Love the Cameos. What a Miracle of a Gift the book is. Do you feel yourself leaning into the Everlasting Arms? Such joy!

My usual routine is to read the text while having my first coffee, read for about an hour. Since bringing home this edition, I'm reading for like four hours. I can't put it down. There is so much information and words in it, I love it. It is more of a personal read for me. It is like I wrote to my older brother asking for guidance and this book is his answering letter.

After two months with this edition, I have found it to be an illuminating work. I have particularly enjoyed using this volume in study groups where others are using volume 2 or 3. We are benefiting from mutual input regarding differences and footnotes.
While the responsibility for learning lies with the student, a good teacher knows when and how to present materials to the student for their benefit. I have had nothing but very positive results using ACIM CE in Course presentation.
As to my personal study, the edits and clarifications have provided exciting discoveries of depth.

I was resistant to buying this book because I have studied the Course in the book originally published by the Foundation of Inner Peace. It has served me well and I was afraid that a "new" edition would be someone else's paraphrasing that thought they could do better than the original. But, I find that this edition, that includes more elucidation, especially of Course principles, is very helpful. I am a Course student of 23 years and still learn every time I read and re-read. I have been a participant in study groups for all of that 23 years, and find I am always learning from other students of the Course as well. I thank Robert Perry for this work.

As a long-time Course student, this new edition of ACIM is raising my understanding of the Course to a whole new level. I understand the concept of “miracles” and the 50 Miracle Principles so much better with the restored background material. I find the footnotes really helpful for understanding confusing passages. And the Cameo Essays give concrete, down-to-earth examples of how the Course teachings should be applied, taken from the lives of Helen and Bill and the advice they received from Jesus.

I'm very pleased by this offering from The Circle of Atonement. Thank you Robert Perry and his team for a masterpiece! I've been a student and teacher of ACIM for nearly thirty years and when I received this book, it completely changed my perspective about my personal relationship with Jesus, broadened my mind on all of the miracle principles, the Cameos, and the text. My organization is using this book as the version that we are using it in our classes in person and online. For any student of A Course in Miracles, please know that this version is powerful and helpful and should be a part of your ACIM library.

The contribution this book makes to the ACIM (A Course in Miracles) community is inestimable. I studied and taught the Course for twenty years, starting in 1985. I still have my original green Arkana edition (from Great Britain, purchased at Findhorn Community bookstore when someone said “buy this book, it will change your life” ), now yellowing and taped together, every page marked with underlines and notes. From time to time I look through it and realize first how much it really did change my life and secondly how much I miss reading and studying it. I have always intended to get back to the Course, and perhaps write down some of my interpretations. All I needed was an event that would get me started, overcome my inertia. The publishing of this edition was that event.

I am in the final stages of publishing a book on which I have worked intensely for five months (unrelated to the Course). I thought that was a great accomplishment. Now I look at this edition, which required that level of involvement by multiple people for six years. The level of commitment and the scholarly output are mind boggling. The end result is not only a lasting legacy for the Circle of Atonement and the people involved in this project, it is a tremendous gift and resource for those studying and using the Course. But that doesn’t mean I agree with all of the content.

Years ago at an ACIM conference in San Francisco I was going to give a talk on my disagreements with Ken Wapnick’s interpretation of the Course. I worked for months on the material, listened to forty hours of taped programs, and had a card file of references three inches thick. The room was full of many of the leaders in the ACIM world. But I got a very clear message from Holy Spirit that it was not my job to criticize Ken Wapnick. So I didn’t give that talk. Instead, I extemporized about my sudden decision not to give it. Some time later, when the book came out comparing Ken Wapnick’s ideas to those of The Circle of Atonement, I sometimes agreed with one side, sometimes the other, and sometimes neither.

Since Ken Wapnick was in charge of the translations of the Course into other languages, it was his version that was institutionalized as the official interpretation. This new edition of the Course does the same thing, but this time expressing the interpretation of the teachers at The Circle of Atonement. This can’t be avoided, of course. Nor does it diminish the value of this book (and the additional notes on the website). I find the personal material from Helen’s notebooks extremely helpful and moving, making the Course much more personal.

Many students struggle with some of the concepts in the Course because they take them literally. We know that those who interpret the Bible literally miss a great deal of depth and meaning by trying to make it historical or factual. It leads to silly things like believing the earth is six thousand years old. The same is true with the Course. It expresses itself in metaphor, as do all religions. The concepts of God and Love and our True Identity are too huge to capture with our small intellects, and in language with subjects and verbs and adjectives. A better attempt is made through art, music, and poetry, which open us to a larger experience. Still, there must be a route more accessible to us. The Course offers us a parable that allows us to change our perception.

The Course itself says it is one of many versions of the Universal curriculum. In format and approach, some of those other versions disagree with the course, in some cases taking just the opposite position. If we use the Course as our sole standard, we must judge other versions mistaken, but we would be misguided. If all other versions are mistaken, then the Course would be the only correct version, which it specifically disclaims. Perhaps it is superior, in that it saves time and suffering and is elegant in its format, but it can still only be metaphor, telling us to act as if what it describes is the truth. Ironically, when we do that, we arrive at the actual Truth. But that still doesn’t make it the only path to get there.

A very obvious example is that of the world. Ken Wapnick, for example, was so convinced that we made the physical universe that he said things like “Why should we enjoy a sunset, it’s just illusion.” Gary Renard in his novel The Disappearance of the Universe spends whole chapters trying to explain the physics of how we literally created the world. Apparently his discarnate mentors were themselves channeling Ken Wapnick.

Yes, the Course frequently uses the phrase “the world you made,” but it is always referring to the fact that our perception determines the unique world we experience. If it meant we made the physical world it would have made that very clear. It never says “literally” and never says “physical.” Consider these examples. 

“The world as you perceive it cannot have been created by the Father, for the world is not as you see it.”

“Think not that you made the world. Illusions, yes, but what is true in earth and Heaven is beyond your naming.”

“His definitions are His laws, for by them He established the universe as what it is.”

“You who cannot even control yourselves should hardly aspire to control the universe.”

“The universe remains unheeding of the laws by which you thought to govern it.”

There is no doubt that the Course says God or Father created the universe, which is itself a metaphor for All That Is. We did have a part in that.

“Think not He wills to bind you, Who has made you co-creator of the universe along with Him.”

“The universe consists of nothing but the Son of God who calls upon his Father.”

“My Self is ruler of the universe.” (Lesson 253)

“A dark and fearful purpose, yet a thought without the power to change one blade of grass from something living to a sign of death.”

We can’t change one blade of grass! Then how can we make a physical universe?

I point this out about the Course being metaphor because the introduction to this new volume could be seen as literal, namely we were in Heaven, forgot to laugh, found ourselves separate, feared God, and made an alternate place to live (our world). In my experience, Robert Perry tends toward literal interpretation, which is his right.

Carried too far, all metaphors eventually break down and make no sense. Taking them literally makes no sense, either. Seeing everything as metaphor frees us from concern about the details, or the scientific explanation, or even the plausibility. It allows us to find our own meaning, not to feel obliged to accept some official line.

What about Jesus? I think he fits right in. On earth he taught by parables, and is now doing it again. “The Kingdom of God is like . . . .” The Course gives us a paradigm (“Consider it as if . . .”) in which to use our limited minds to conceptualize the route to changed perception, forgiveness, miracles, love and salvation. It’s a darn good way.

I am really enjoying working with the Complete and Annotated version of A Course in Miracles. I am inspired by the new material in the Text. I find the annotations extremely useful for clarfiying terminology that I might have just skimmed over and giving me a greater understanding of some of the language used. The annotations also act as reminders of points already made and provide me with a more thorough insight into the origins of the psychological terms that are used.

I would recommend this to anyone who wants to work with the Course in its purist form and commend Robert Perry and all those at The Circle of Atonement for such a beautifully clear and precise reproduction of Helen's original notes.

Jude 1:3 “Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once (conclusively) delivered unto the saints.”
Friends, I pray to God the Father that you don’t get sucked into this new age heresy. The hour is late and if you want to know your savior, Jesus, Messiah, The Holy One of Israel, please buy a bible instead. There is zero scriptural integrity found anywhere in the pages of this book. Yeshua/Jesus is NOT speaking to the author. She’s selling lies from Hell. Beware.

I purchased this book for a family member, and as soon as she opened it she could tell but it was not produced properly. Most notably, she contacted the group that wrote this Edition, and found that her copy had about 50 pages missing entirely! In addition, there were smears and marks on pages, as if the gluing was bad quality. I don't know if this was one random occurrence or if there's a larger batch of defective copies.

The footnotes are very intrusive. The purity and holiness of acim does not shine through. The whole thing feels way more like "let's talk about a course in miracles and what I think it means" than what it was mean to be as it already is now. I received it as a gift, I would not recommend it . I will Stick with the good ol course as it was released decades ago. It was pretty clear before a bunch of other versions came out, really no need for new ones. The main thing I keep in mind is to simply practice what it teaches. Thanks!

Amazing. Something about this original version: It reads more like a psychology book than a spiritual book. You can really see why the Voice chose a psychologist to scribe this. Obviously there is much more to say about it than that, but if I were to say all there is to say about it, it would take the rest of my life. *Extremely* recommended.

Contrary to what you might hear, the original scribes of the Course, Helen Schucman and Bill Thetford, both agreed to take all of the personal material out of the final edition of A Course in Miracles. That material was then stolen from the archives and published without the consent of the foundation set up to preserve it. But don't take my word for it, do your own due diligence, not just on this issue, but more importantly, on what the Course itself is saying. On that note, taking this edition here as somehow the more inclusive and truer edition of the Course will take your further away from the deeper nondual message of the Course.