In this remarkable session, Bartholomew drew a vivid distinction between the sage and the ordinary person - not in essence, but in the willingness to stop creating mental images. He also offered rare and detailed teachings on the Divine Feminine incarnations, including Radha, Mary, and a future female avatar destined for India.

Context: This is the first part of a private session with a visitor (a physician), in which Bartholomew responded to questions about the nature of sages and saints, divine incarnations of the feminine principle, the Buddha's path to enlightenment, and Ramana Maharshi's teaching method. The session also included personal guidance about service and community.

Sages, Saints, and Image-Making: Asked whether there is any real difference between sages and ordinary people, Bartholomew said that at the level of essence there is absolutely none - all share the same divine source. The seeming difference lies in what the mind does with that source. Ordinary people constantly pull from the basic substance of consciousness to create mental images - thoughts, dramas, projections - and then believe these images to be real, much as a child shapes clay into a doll and then believes it is alive. The sage, by contrast, has seen through this process. Having observed how images rise and fall endlessly without ever delivering lasting meaning, the sage simply stops creating them. In that surrender, divine meaning - which is constantly moving through all things - is allowed to flow through the sage's being unobstructed, bringing spontaneous knowing and speech without the mediation of image-making.

The Process of Transformation: For those earlier on the spiritual path, Bartholomew recommended watching one's thoughts and substituting positive, loving thoughts for the ego's habitual negativity - its endless comparing, analyzing, and judging. As this becomes tedious, one moves into a deeper process of surrender: putting aside all thinking and resting in divine awareness. The more moments of one's day spent in that awareness, the more its reality becomes apparent, and gradually the exchange is made from the thought-realm to direct knowing.

Divine Incarnations of the Feminine: Bartholomew offered rare teachings on the incarnations of the Divine Mother. He identified Radha as the first and foremost - a real human woman and the true divine counterpart of Krishna, who was himself a divine manifestation rather than a historical person. Mary, mother of Jesus, was similarly sent by the Divine Mother to support her son, though her extraordinary purity and faith have received far too little recognition. Bartholomew also mentioned Shenanda, the counterpart of Sananda (the Christ), who incarnated in Persia but whose teachings were never recorded due to cultural disregard for the feminine. He predicted that a powerful female divine incarnation would come to India, challenging that culture's deep prejudice against recognizing women as spiritual equals - a prejudice he noted runs through Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam alike.

The Buddha, Ramana Maharshi, and the Jnani Path: Bartholomew described how the Buddha achieved liberation by tracing the entire strand of his incarnative pattern back to the very first arising of individual consciousness from the divine fire, and seeing the substance from which that first thought arose - at which point all thinking ended and only being remained. Ramana Maharshi taught essentially the same path: go back the way you came, pursue each thought to its source, and ask relentlessly where it arose from. Bartholomew noted that the path of wisdom (jnani) and the path of the heart (compassion) are ultimately one and always end in the same place.

Personal Guidance on Service: In a moving personal exchange, Bartholomew encouraged the visitor to consider supporting the emerging community being built by Mary-Margaret and Justin Moore, describing them as rare beings who had put aside all fear to follow divine guidance. He emphasized that they would need practical help - gardening, building, book work - and emotional support from believers who could shore up their confidence during inevitable moments of doubt. He stressed that such service should only be undertaken if genuinely felt, never from obligation.