Gospel Revealed
I must start this short “treatise” with a brief disclaimer. Although I was aware of the Jesus figure as long as I remember, I never followed The Way. To me, New Testament (NT) was just a cryptic bigoted writing that smelled of dank baroque churches and putrid myrrh. It was only after I realized who I am and reread it that I realized how profound it is.
Not in its entirety — anything by Saul as well as all the other apostolic epistles and acts can be safely thrown into a trashcan without substantial loss as they only muddle the whole message — but the four canonical gospels, Gospel of Thomas (for cross-reference), and perhaps also Book of Revelation, which is, however, not essential in terms of understanding The Way, are pure gold.
So, let’s start.
Who is Jesus
Whether he was a historical figure or not, Jesus is portrayed in NT as a principled enlightened teacher, so steadfast in his character that he rather died than compromised his teachings. Where other people deny and recant, Jesus stood his ground despite the grave consequences. This is nicely depicted in canonical gospels by Simon Peter’s denial after Jesus was arrested by Romans, and it’s the same pattern which can be observed also in relatively recent history by examples of Giordano Bruno and Galileo Galilei respectively.
When it comes to actual death of Jesus and subsequent alleged resurrection, which is according to almost all Christians the hinge point of Christianity, there are two points that must be noted. First, the oldest of gospels (Mark) does not contain the resurrection narrative (its oldest version ends with women visiting the tomb and encountering a person clad in white robes telling them that Jesus is not there), and second, the usual underpinning of atonement theology relies upon an incorrect understanding of the preposition “for” which is used in the meaning of “because,” as well as misinterpretation of allegoric usage of the meaning of sacrificial rites of that time.
As for Jesus’ enlightened “status”, there are various long tractates and theological positions, but no actual consensus, about the nature of Jesus’ “divinity.” However, John 10:22–39 clearly shows that Jesus was a normal mortal man who realized that he is one with God. Furthermore, he was obviously well aware that such “status” is available to anyone. And just as a side note, no one really knows whether the “one and only” mentioned in John 3:16 is really “one and only” or whether it actually means “firstborn,” which Jesus, as consummation of Judaic tradition (or fulfillment of the law), definitely was (similarly to Siddhartha and Vedic lore).
In that way, Jesus invited everyone to put faith in what he had to offer, follow his example, hold to the principles he outlined, and eventually know God, enter His kingdom (or return to Eden, if you will), and thus be saved from “earthly suffering,” which stems from our evolutionary development (most probably induced by usage of psychotropic plants — women were at that time the “gathering” part of hunter-gatherers and there is initially a rather palpable notion of “tampering with the foreboding” most psychonauts know all too well), which happened roughly 100 kya and resulted in emergence of abstract symbolic thinking and awareness of our (human!) mortality.
The Way in Theory
I elaborated on this several times already, so, just a brief recapitulation. As one can read in Matt. 22:36–40, all what Jesus asked of his followers was very simple: only to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. After all, these two commandments encompass the whole Torah, that is, Ten Words.
However, unlike traditional Judaic understanding, which is (in addition to misinterpreting what actually constitutes The Law) concerned merely with outward behavior in the vein of “at least fake it, even if you don’t bother to make it”, Jesus, similarly to Buddha, encourages tracing even the faintest mental images and impulses that could cloud one’s discernment and subsequently lead to idolatry, hatred, greed, etc. (See Matt. 5, aka introduction to the sermon on the Mount, particularly verses 21–48.)
And just as a side note, “to love” does not equate with “to be nice” as a lot of feel-good liberal Christians would like to have it. After all, you can read throughout the whole NT how Jesus regularly rebuked, chastised, even attacked not only the misguided religious authorities, money changers, and all who acted in bad faith, but also his ignorant apostles, even to the point he once addressed Simon Peter as Satan, essentially telling him, “Take your BS and go to hell, my friend.” (see Mark 8:33 or Matt. 16:23).
The Way in Practice
Similarly to the simplicity of the “theory,” the practical part of The Way is plain, elementary, and straightforward (see Matt. 6):
- Don’t hoard material possessions and give freely what you have to those who need it. But don’t boast about it or put it on display, because that’s just puffing up your ego by aggrandizing yourself as the generous one. Do it in the same way in which you breathe. This is equivalent to karma yoga.
- Meditate on the meaning of Lord’s Prayer. Do it in private for exactly the same reasons why you should not boast about your generosity, and contemplate its words carefully — don’t use it as a mantra to induce trance. This is the equivalent of jnana yoga. (So yeah, that fast, repeated, cyclic praying in public spaces, church included, whether it’s Pater Noster or Hail Mary, as well as the Protestant freestyle prayer, are actually completely against Jesus’ teaching.)
- Fast. Again, make it so, that you don’t go around implicitly or explicitly proclaiming, “Look how pious I am, I’m sooo fasting.” Since fasting can result in altered states of awareness, this practice can be equated with raja yoga. And just a remark — no matter the way you make yourself enter the altered states of awareness, it should be always done in private, otherwise it not only defeats the purpose, but you also increase the risk of a bad trip.
- And finally, trust universe, trust God. Submit yourself to the causality of the world, live in the present moment, and accept what comes your way without fear and worry. That’s the bhakti yoga of Jesus.
The Way in Warnings
However rare they are, all teachers worth their salt remind and warn their followers of the potential pitfalls on the way to absolute truth. And Jesus was no exception. He warned against false teachers who entertain the cult of their personality and literally eat their followers alive, stripping them of reason, sanity, as well as possessions (Matt. 7:15–20). He warned against not walking the talk (Matt. 7:21–27). (So, dear protestants, your proclamations of faith mean nothing — you are not saved by grace, that’s just your lazy, wishful thinking.) He warned that you must walk The Way 24/7, otherwise you get inevitably caught off guard and lapse to your old destructive habits when you take a “leave of absence” and expect it the least. He stressed that while you put your possessions (Luke 18:25) or even your family (Matt. 10:34–36) above the dedication to The Way, there is no chance in either Heaven or Hell that you will enter the “gate of salvation.” He also warned against entertaining social hierarchies (Matt. 20:20–28), segregation of people based on value judgments (Matt. 7:1–2), and so on and so forth.
As you can (hopefully) see, this is the exact same recipe for self-realization that can be found in Tao Te t’ing and also Vedas, Gita, or Dhammapada, if you stripped them to their essential core. As is also obvious, people who call themselves Christians nowadays, are, almost without exception, definitely not followers of Jesus, despite what they may believe or claim. Their fruits talk for themselves. Hence, don’t be a Christian but walk the Way. At first glance, and despite the obvious simplicity, it may appear daunting. But, once you set your mind straight and decide to follow trough, it’s actually pretty fast, easy and rewarding.
Amen.
