Translating the Divine Principle

M. Inglis
January 19, 1999

I would like to add my experiences with God, Father and Jesus regarding our new translation of the Black Book, which was published as "Exposition of the Divine Principle" 1996.

In Dec 94, I was praying to God about the re-translation of this book because the original was so full of errors. The clear answer in my prayer was go ahead and do it. I talked to Rev. Zin Moon Kim about this and he said Father would never permit it, so forget it. I couldn't forget it, so I determined in prayer to do it anyway, irrespective of Fathers approval.

I was then led and I mean led to Jin Goon Kim who was attending Barrytown at the time. I talked to him about whether he would work with me in translating this book. (His English is excellent / he is the adopted son of Won Pil Kim / offered by Pres. and Mrs. [Hyo Won] Eu / Pres. Eu wrote the book in Korean) He was very excited and keen to do it.

He spent the next 2 weeks translating the introduction. Based on this we both knew with certainty that it needed doing. We decided it would be best to talk to Father about it if possible, an opportunity came when Father wanted the new color version published. Together we went to East Garden for breakfast and had the opportunity to show Father the original Korean and the old and new translations. He showed a great deal of interest and very quickly blessed our endeavor. Much to everyone's surprise but mine. He was very rational about it -- if it was wrong it needed fixing. He indicated that we needed to work with Mrs. [Won Pok] Choi, the original translator.

We then set up a translation and editing team: Jin Goon Kim, Andy Wilson, June Saunders and myself as the core with our own Dan Fefferman (who worked on the original translation with Mrs. Choi) and Tyler Hendricks helping. We worked through the next seven months creating the new book.

All four of us had deep spiritual experiences with Father, Jesus and Pres. Eu while working together. Andy and Jin Goon then took the completed manuscript and a few specific questions to Mrs. Choi in Korea who was very happy with the finished product.

We notified Father that we were ready to publish. He then asked that Won Pil Kim, Young Whi Kim and Chung Hwan Kwak approve the text. We sent it to all three, giving them a six week deadline. All three responded favorably with only a couple of minor changes from Kwak.

At this point I had a deep spiritual experience with Jesus. This was Dec. 95 and our daughter was to be born shortly in Idaho, we adopted her there. I was praying one evening that God could bless our adoption when I had a vision of Jesus walking up a distant hill. As I got closer I could make out that he was carrying his cross over his shoulder. I was immediately struck by the size of his cross. 12' long 3'' x 10'' post with an equally large cross piece. The end of the post had left a deep furrow in the earth as it was dragged along. Jesus turned to face me and shouted at me "Will this book (Divine Principle) carry my cross?" My immediate response "Yes".

He then asked me to raise my arms while kneeling and I felt this force pulling them back as if they were nailed to the cross. After about 5 minutes the pain began. I was released shortly thereafter. Jesus then returned and smiled and said: "Because I don't have children I want to adopt your daughter with you". I know he visits her often.

There is only one Divine Principle, it cannot be written down, it must be experienced. Books can only help us to have the experiences of God's heart and truth that we must have in order to incarnate His/Her spirit.