This is the Foreword to BECOMING, Coming into Being, written by Nathan M. Shippee and published by Prudential Press in 1979.

"Everything else
Is in a state of becoming:
God
Is in a state of being."

-- Robertson, 1853

What does it mean to be a Human Being? What is the destiny of a Human Being? The questions are pertinent because we do not understand who we are or what we are about.

Accepting that we are "Human" Beings is to say at the outset that we are "qualified" Beings. "Being" without any qualification is the proper name for God. As Human Beings, we have a duality, and we must first identify which "who" we are, and which "what" we are about before we can find satisfying answers to the mysteries of life.

The ten essays which follow are a record of the path taken by the author in his efforts to find answers to these questions. Each essay contains findings that are satisfying to the author, but may be less than conclusive to the reader. This would be more remarkable if it were not so, for the undeniable uniqueness of the Human Being is universal, and the search for understanding is indeed a personal experience.

The approach used by the author in his quest was to distill impressions from the vast store of information available, and then to simplify, simplify, simplify until the Human destiny could be described in one phrase; its concept captured in a single word.

Neither the "ascending animal" nor the "fallen angel" concepts of our evolutionary process were personally acceptable. Some other concept of the process called life was sought, but it was not until The Sum of the Parts that the impression came clear. The elusive concept that finally appeared was: "Coming into Being," a concept that seemed compatible with all thought and that could capture in a single word the saga of human destiny: "Becoming."

Becoming, becoming more Being, coming more into Being -- Being; isn't this the destiny of the Human Being? Becoming is the passage each must make from Human into Being. It is a private path along which each is guided by an inner voice, an echo from the soul.

Once the concept of "becoming" enters the mind, our questions change. We are still full of wonder, but now we wonder more pointedly:

"Coming from where?
"Becoming what?"

These are our true compass points, the East and the West of our lifetime.

Reader's Comment: "For a slim book, BECOMING has more pregnant ideas in it, more thought-provoking prose, more mind-stretching philosophy than the proverbial six-foot shelf of "standards." Thank you again for sending me a copy; I savored reading your essays." JH, University Dean

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