A few weeks ago, there was citation in our Bible Lesson that gave me pause. I’m writing this to capture my thinking since, because I keep adding levels of understanding, so I’m thinking a record of this train of thought would be of benefit to both me and you. The quote was from Leviticus, “Thou shalt not sew thy field with mingled seed.” (Lev 19:19).

My head snapped upon reading that because our new website, which mingles art and spirituality was going live at the time! Now, after much consideration, I realize that those two things are not essentially different in the way to be avoided. Whew!

This phrase is not to be taken literally either. Consider the Native Americans planting the “Three Sisters”–corn, beans, and squash together, because they each help the others to grow. The corn gives the beans something to climb up, the beans bring needed nutriments to the soil, and the squash spreads out, sheltering the all their roots, and cause moisture to be retained. The brilliance of encouraging this type of symbiotic relationship is not what this edict attempts to guard against.

So what does it refer to? My study revealed these other corroborating quotes, which set me on the right trail:

• “Does a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?” James 3:11
• “A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.” James 1:8
• “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.” (Matthew 6:24)
• “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” (Matthew 6:22)
• “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot.” (Revelation 3:15)

We can’t have it both ways. Fire doesn’t mingle with frost. Good doesn’t mingle with evil. Light doesn’t mingle with darkness. Spirit doesn’t mingle with matter. Wherever I am, I’m not somewhere else. We need to either say yes or no, not maintain a wavering, noncommittal answer.

I have long appreciated the dictionary meaning of the word “purity.” It translates as “unmixed.” I always thought that insight quite brilliant and helpful. This whole mingled seed concept is talking about purity.

However, it is also highlighting that opposites cannot coexist. This is profound metaphysically. If God is infinitely ever-present, all-powerful Love, then nothing unlike that can actually occur.

Much of the world lives in a yin/yang state, saying that “we’ve got to take the bad with the good.” No, we don’t!  We are not a mixture of opposites, neither are we balancing or navigating inner or outer polarities, nor do we have to try to mitigate the types of opposites we don’t want, attempting to lower their percentages.

What we identify as supreme is what will govern us in this temporal experience. What really is supreme will overcome any supposed opposite in an every absolute and eternal way. Duality does not– cannot– play a part. It is cancelled out and obliterated by whatever is most true.

In this obscure Biblical reference, we’re wisely being counseled to consciously choose only our ideal, and to sow it in our life. You can’t have two ideals, because if you try to have two, they’ll conflict, and it basically means you don’t have any. Again, “A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways,” applies. Stop equivocating. Stop playing both sides off the middle.

“Choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”  (Joshua 24:15)