In my last post I discussed two verses that I believe sum up a core theme of the Bible: not only is god-potential latent in every human being, but we are god. In this post I am going to explore this concept further by discussing Colossians 2:9. I’ll close with a little information on the potential of the human brain and DNA, two subjects which will become more frequent in upcoming posts.
Let’s review our foundation scripture first:
“For in him [Christ] dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.”
There is a treasure-trove of knowledge in that verse that few high-ranking religious authorities don’t want the average person to understand; it would open up a pretty big can of worms. Fortunately for most religious authorities, they perpetuate wrong information about scriptures like these simply because they do not know any better.
For many years Christian scholarship has argued that Colossians 2:9 was used by Paul to combat Gnosticism. This is because some Gnostic sects taught the Jesus was an ordinary human who achieved divinity through gnosis, a type of intuitive spiritual knowledge. As the argument goes, Paul directly confronted this philosophy with Col. 2:9 so the church at Colossae would know that Jesus was the fullness of God in the flesh.
Personally, I think this argument is silly. Here’s why:
One of Christianity’s foundational arguments is that Jesus was qualified to be the savior of the world because he became fully human. Hebrews 2:17 states:
“Therefore, it was necessary for him [Christ] to be made in every respect like us, his brothers and sisters…”
Right there a core tenant of mainstream Christianity has been contradicted when combined with Colossians 2:9. If we are not god, then Christ was not made like me in every respect because he was God. The equation doesn’t add up:
We are not God + Jesus was God = Jesus was like us!
Um, sorry…no comprendo!
Therefore we must ask the question: how then can Jesus truly identify with me? Some religious authorities will counter by saying that Jesus was both fully God and fully man. For example, consider this quote from a website which symbolizes a majority of mainstream Christian thoughts on this subject:
“In addition to being fully divine, Jesus is fully human. He has both an infinite, divine mind and a finite, human mind. He can be said not to know things because he is a human and finite—human minds are not omniscient. And Jesus can be said to know all things because he is divine and infinite in his knowledge. Paradoxical as it is, we must affirm that Jesus both knows all things and doesn’t know all things. For the unique, two-natured person of Christ, this is no contradiction…”
What!? Of course this is a contradiction. It’d be like trying to tell my son that Santa Claus is both real and not real, or that 2 + 2 = 4 and 5.
The real problem with this quote is the last sentence. Even this site acknowledges that this two-natured person of Christ is unique. Again, this directly contradicts mainstream Christian theology which states that he became exactly like us!
It should also be stated that even if Jesus cast his divinity aside, he still had the option to take it up again. The miracles he performed certainly suggest that he did! According to Christian doctrine, you and I don’t have this option, therefore by their own admission he still can’t truly identify with us.
My purpose is not to trash mainstream Christianity—I once believed all this nonsense myself. But I want to show you the deeper message of Colossians 2:9.
In order for that scripture to be true, then Jesus could not be God and be like everyone else unless everyone else was god too! This is the esoteric meaning of that scripture.
Think about it: Christianity teaches we are not god, but Jesus was. And Jesus truly became exactly like us, even though he was god! The only way you can reconcile all of this is to conclude that we are god too! The only difference between being a god and not being one is lacking the intuitive knowledge that can only be gained through gnosis—i.e., a conscious, spiritual experience similar to the ones taught in Eastern philosophy and religion (expansion of consciousness).
So is it possible that the Gnostics had something right? You’re damn right they did!
As I have stated before, the problem is that most people fail to realize what god is. We have been conditioned to believe he is the omnipotent bearded man in the sky controlling every aspect of the universe. If all of us understood who we truly are and what reality truly is, then we would all realize that we are all directly influencing creation every day of our lives with our own free will. Consciousness is truly amazing. I have always believed that that which we call god is the power of consciousness.
The Depths of Colossians 2:9
Colossians 2:9 is teaching that deity exists in a human body. The human body was built as a vessel in order to express the divine (love and compassion).
Let me give you a couple of other interesting ways of looking at the above scripture that supports the above conclusion.
“For in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.”
In the Greek, that word for him (autos) is a reflexive pronoun with multiple meanings, one being the “self.”
Could that scripture really mean, “For in “the self” dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” Paul is clearly speaking of the Christ Jesus here. I know this. But I believe Paul was thinking like a Gnostic. Jesus Christ is a symbol for the divine self in esoteric thought. There are many interesting scriptures that use the masculine “him” when referring to Jesus that would more properly translate—according to close textual analysis—“it.” (more on that in a future post).
Before you think I am talking crazy here, consider that the author of Colossians argues that it is the Father who transfers people into the body of his Son (Col. 1:12, 13) instead of the usual mainstream Christian doctrine which states it is through the Son that man is translated into the Kingdom of the Father. This would further support the concept that Jesus Christ, as the Logos, represents philosophically something very different than what we’re taught to believe!
So what do I mean by saying human bodies were built to contain the fullness of the Godhead?
What that verse really means is that the fullness of the Godhead was meant to dwell bodily in you!
We, as self aware conscious human beings, have the choice to operate on any frequency of love or fear that we want. We simply make the conscious (or unconscious) choices to live and vibrate at either frequency. There is no limit to the amount of different expressions we can choose to manifest and broadcast these frequencies. And whatever frequency we are operating on creates the life that unfolds in front of us. This is why Jesus was able to remind the Pharisees that “ye are gods” from their own scriptures because we are always creating with our thoughts, beliefs, emotions, and actions.
The power of the brain
The brain is a microcosm of the universe. Just as there are billions of galaxies and stars, there are billions of neurons in your brain. And just as there seems to be an infinite amount of energy and arrangements of matter patterns in the universe, there is the same infinite potential for the establishment of information pathways in the human brain.
We are truly a microcosm of the macrocosm! Hence that old axiom in esoteric circles:
“As above, so below.”
It has been stated that the average neuron contains as many as 10,000 connections with other neurons. Did you know that each of these connections can be turned off or on? Can you imagine the number of firing patterns that is possible with such figures? Probably as many atoms are there are in the known universe!
The human brain seems limited in its function because we see ourselves as so limited in our own reality, but a new reality can be created at will using the power of our minds. I have lots more information to share on this but I am going to save it for the upcoming post where it will make more sense as it relates to what the Bible stories are really telling us about this concept.
DNA
What about DNA? Instead of going into this subject myself, I am providing a link to an interesting article on DNA from a website I recently discovered by Pao L. Chang. He’s got some other interesting information you mind find fascinating as well. Even though there are only a few comments in this article he wrote, they make for some very interesting ideas. I suggest you read them as well.
Closing thoughts
Certainly we are gods in potential, but many religious authorities refuse see it that way. Mainly this is because they interpret the Bible too literally. But there is a fundamental deeper problem here. It would seem that human nature gravitates towards being helpless and hopeless instead of seeing the amazing potential that is dormant within them. I believe Jesus’ message was really more about our god-potential than about our hopeless sinful nature, but human would rather be saved than explore the concept that maybe we say ourselves.
Doing this post has opened some ideas on how to present to you what the Bible has really been saying all along about our hidden potential and how to manifest the Christ within us. I am going to stick with the topic of the human brain in the next few posts. I’ll be discussing more about why Adam and Even are symbolic of the fact that we had to fall from paradise, and how the twelve tribes of Israel represents your brain as well as how the tribe of Judah, another aspect of your brain, helps manifest the Christ within us
Blessings!
I agree with you Joshua, each and everyone of us is a part of God. Each one of us has the God-spark within–our Soul, or Higher Self. Through our Higher Self we have a direct connection to All That Is (which is what I consider “God” to be.) We consist of both the God-aspect (the soul, higher self, the non-physical, the part of us that does not die) and the human aspect (the body, the physical, the current incarnation). This is true for both Jesus and for each and every one of us.
Each one of us is a unique aspect of God with unique gifts and paths. I believe Jesus to have had a unique aspect that allowed him to be a forerunner 2000 years ago, hence his path of teaching. I believe Jesus was one of the “first born” souls, a revolutionary, an explosive, that had an important role to play in the “fall in consciousness” on Earth. His incarnations before and the experiences he had in earlier ages taught him a great deal, which allowed him to gain deep spiritual truths that he could then share with others. His wisdom did not come to him just because he wanted it to, but because of his very important role in the Fall itself, many millenia before his incarnation as Jesus.
I have not learned this from books, but I got it by piecing together information I got intuitively and from revelations from certain personal experiences I had. It makes a lot of sense to me.
Re: The human body was built as a vessel in order to express the divine (love and compassion). You are right on!
Well said, Christine! I still think there is a lot to the Jesus story that is not known, but I understand that everyone has their personal experiences. I do know that the story of the Gospels follows the zodiac. Whether this was divinely inspired as some Christians believe remains for us to be discovered. Personally, I think it’s possible the Gospel stories were inspired by someone, but I highly doubt it went down as the Gospels explain. For me, the Bible stories are allegories written to teach us about abstract spiritual concepts that cannot be explained literally. Thanks for letting me know you were here. I hope you are doing well.
Hey thanks again for another great article. It seems that when the Bible is taken literally it can easily become a form of idol worship. It doesnt “have” to be applied, just believed. To me this was a religous notion that always sparked division between people. Exactly what the Bible says NOT to do. Today i had a thought that sparked some new questions, as always. This question involves the passover. The passover is something that has been going on for thousands of years and represents the sacrifice of a holy pure lamb. This obvously relates with Christ. My struggle has been understanding how such a literal event practiced for hundreds of generations and hints at the coming Messiah is then transformed into a text-based esoteric writing. Especially when Christ himself says,” Dont mix with the Pharisee yeast”, which is a reference to the unleavened bread(yeast free) eaten at passover meals and during the last supper he refers to eating the unleavened bread meaning becoming ‘ONE” with him. So then we have a new esoteric allegory coming out of something that had literally been going on for thousands of years.The transition between this literal event into a non literal alegory seems a little farfetched especially when they say Jesus was taught in Jewish traditions..But at the same time, when literalism starts becoming rampant the meaning of the Bible decreases into almost nothing except ‘believe and be good.” If you could help clarify these possible misconceptions that would be great.
Adam,
You stated:
“It seems that when the Bible is taken literally it can easily become a form of idol worship. It doesnt “have” to be applied, just believed.”
Right on! It took me a long time to understand this! About your question on the passover: I’ll do some research, but I don’t think this practice has been going on the way it was portrayed in the Bible for as long as we have been led to believe. In fact, much of our current history taught in schools and universities is not accurate. Regardless of how long this tradition has been practiced, your question does bring up a good point. Just because I am curious, I have a very good Jewish friend who’ll I talk to about how long this tradition has been going on. It definitely wasn’t started by during the Exodus from Egypt. I don’t have the time right now, but if you’re patient I will definitely address it in a future blog post. Esoterically that is.
Thanks for your insightful questions and thoughts, Adam.
Here is another verse Psalm 46:10…. Be still and….know that I AM God. Read this out loud a few times and think about what Josh is trying to communicate. Could it be that the person who wrote this verse disguised it in such a way that the dull of hearing would not understand the true meaning but the spiritually mature person would know…I AM GOD.
Thats a very good point. I have come to that conclusion myself.
Interesting thought, Frank! Another activity that can be very revealing is to look into a mirror when it’s perfectly quite. Then meditate on who it is staring back at you behind the persona.
The number of atoms in the observable universe is about 10^80. According to Claude Shannon’s influential 1950 paper titled “Programming a Computer for Playing Chess”. Even a simple game of chess has possible 10^40 times as many possibilities. In other words, for every atom in the universe, you could associate 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 separate and distinct possible chess games. All this possibility from a board with 64 squares and 32 pieces. Most scientific estimates put the human brain at about 100 billion (10^11) neurons and 100 trillion (10^14) synapses. So our potential arrangement of our consciousness filters are beyond my ability to compute. And speaking of microcosm of the macrocosm I have always found it no coincidence that the holographic theory of the brain and the holographic theory of the universe started developing at the same time from David Bohm’s work in quantum physics and Karl Pribam’s work in neuroscience. I recommend the book “The Holographic Universe: The Revolutionary Theory of Reality” by Michael Talbot. I have read it at least three times and will no doubt pick it up again sometime soon.
The mystery of God and the mystery of consciousness are the same mystery. I don’t know if we can know it, but I know we can express it.
Brandon,
Incredible information as always! I only hope some of the other readers get to see it as well. I was visiting Barnes and Nobles Saturday night to pick up a gift for a birthday present. I wish I had thought of picking up Micheal’s book. In fact, I was asking my wife if she remembered any of the titles I had told here I wanted. It sounds like a must read!
By the way, have you read The Conscious Universe by Dean Radin? It’s probably not as interesting as Talbot’s book, but it is another good read for delving deeper into the evidence for telepathy, clairvoyance, and prayer. Dean Radin is a respected expert in the field of parapsychology by many PH.D.’s.
Thanks Brandon, I appreciate you taking this conversation to a higher level!
By the way everyone,
Here is an insightful question posted on the THEOBLOGY blog at Patheos that I thought was relevant to this post.
“What does it mean in terms of neurobiology to say that Christ had both a human and a divine “will” if all thought is really just neurons firing?And if Jesus doesn’t have a brain that is noticeably different from you or I, how does his divinity interact with his thought process?”
This person is asking the right questions about Jesus and the rest of us, but still failing to put together the fact that God is expressed in the physical body. Spirit needs a body to express itself, and our individual lives are the byproduct of this manifestation. And as Brandon pointed out, the conscious brain is very powerful. Limiting thought to firing neurons is oversimplified.
I’m surprised you haven’t touched on the important words of St. Athanasius which are the cornerstone of Orthodox sprituality, too often ignored and forgotten by the West. “God become man in order that man might become God”.
Of course, I would argue (if that were possible with Athanasius, the old crank!) that this becoming is not from an external source (I ask Jesus/God to come into my life) but from an internal source, one which has always been there. Jesus told me that I am the light of the world, not that someday I might become a light in the world.
And another note for processing. If we are gods, called as well to greater works than Jesus, then we too are called to die for the sins of the world. hmmmm.
Scott,
Thanks for pointing this out to me! Funny how someone so important to early church history could say something like this and Christendom can forget about it!
Your last point also gives something for Christians to think about. Excellent!
Thanks for taking the time to add something valuable to the discussion.
Hi Joshua,
I recently discovered your blog and am browsing through it. I recognize a lot and could not agree with you more. Lots of things I already discovered for myself, coming from a slightly different angle, Hebrew numerology, and the results only confirm each other.
But did Jesus in fact die for the sins of mankind or is that just an invention of the church? I feel he came to remind us of Who we really are and to teach and show us the way back to our divine status. The story of his life, death and resurrection is in fact the story of our own spiritual evolution. Of course our life and death do have an impact on the world just as his did as all is One, so everything we do, say or think may benefit or harm the world. And it is good to be reminded of that.
But dying for the sins of the world? Does a loving God require that? I do not think so. In fact this explanation of the crucifixion was so abhorrent to me that I left the church because of it and I set out to search for a new meaning which obviously you also did.
Anny
Anny,
Numerology is an interesting subject. Glad to know that you see the connections. If people would only take the time to truly check out why the scriptures say what they say instead of believing what their pastors tell them, they too, would see the connections.
Personally, I believe the Jesus of the Gospels is based on the life of a real individual, but as you say, the Jesus in our Bibles is an exaggerated version that is more symbolic for our lives than factually based on a man that lived 2000 years ago. I don’t think Jesus was necessarily an invention of the church, more so an invention of the mystics. The way we have interpreted this Jesus is definitely an invention of the church!
Thanks for taking the time to comment. Blessings!
Hi Josh,
I too believe that Jesus is a historical figure. The stories about his life I think are told in order to bring a universal truth to the people and there are patterns there that you also find in other religions which is very sensible I think. The interpretation of the crucifixion however is what I see as an invention of the church that does not do anybody any good.
Anny
“There was no historical Jesus.”
A new age concept I have heard, time and again. Why can’t he be both physical and spiritual? Are not we both physical and spiritual beings? To negate the physical (in my opinion) is taking away from the omnipotent power of God.
I’m with Joshua on this one.
Anny,
Dying for the sins of the world? Yes. But that does ask one to define sin, doesn’t it? Is sin the “bad” things we do? Is it lack of knowledge? Is it not awakening to the reality and truth of who we are? His life, death, and resurrection need to be considered as a whole work, not separate. And as I understand this now, this threefold work created a new morphic field which then allows people (believers, to use a worn church phrase) to access grace and awareness which was not accessible (at least easily) before his work.
Did a loving God require this? I would say that Jesus required this as the final stage of his journey as a human unifying with God. This was a complete and final submission of will (not that God willed his death, one cannot logically state that), and I think the final words of Jesus on the cross “It is finished” is concerning his own journey on oneness with the will of the Father, not with paying some cosmic debt.
Scott
Scott
Hi Scott,
Thank you for your clarification. When you put it like this, I totally agree with you. It is a new way for me to describe the processes we are talking about but I like it.
I exclusively meant the interpretation of the church which is unacceptable to me.
Anny
Jesus became the son of God by bearing the fruit of his Father from within his own heart, which is how he became the Christ, which is the culmination of the two divine attributes of God: spirit and word or love and truth. His crucifixion, a cup he did not want to drink of, but did out of love for his fellowman, so that we may understand what has taken place within our own hearts. We have crucified truth form within our own heart and it is within the heart that we resurrect truth, as Jesus was resurrected in the earth. The earth/heart anagram is no coincidence!
“It is finished” tells me that he not only finished his own works, but finished demonstrated these works for us so that we too could complete the works of a spiritual creation; that of “a new heaven and a new earth,” symbolizing “a new mind and a new heart,” which I believe he completed between the ages of 18 and 30.
I do believe we incurred a spiritual debt when we crucified the truth within our heart, which we repay by resurrecting truth within our heart. The time to do this is now, in what is the 3rd day (the beginning of the 3rd thousandth year since the death of the one that symbolizes Truth), as Jesus was resurrected in the earth on the 3rd day.
Scott,
He called them “gods” unto whom the word of God came… “the parable is this: the seed is the word of God.” Luke 8:11. How do we receive the spiritual seed/word of God? Through spiritual works, as Jesus said, “believe the works” (John 10:38), the word “believe” meaning “obey, to put action to.” We receive the spiritual seed of God through these spiritual works. If the spiritual seed of God (truth) is conceived within that spiritual womb called the heart, it will bring forth a god or son of The God (not God). Jesus was the physical manifestation of the word of God; the spiritual seed of God made flesh.
The “greater works” that Jesus is referring to are the spiritual works, through which our spiritual blindness, deafness, etc., are healed.
Jesus died for our sins, but the word “for” has been misinterpreted. It does not mean “in place of,” but rather “because of.” Jesus (symbolizing Truth) dies for/because of sin (iniquity/lies):
“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities…” Isaiah 53:5
He was wounded because of our transgressions, because of our iniquities; because of our sins.
Hi Joshua,
I also came to this conclusion. I had been pondering/meditating on statements like God is ONE…there is no one beside me…All things are made by him, for him, through him….and the I AM in the old testament being a continuing participle more aptly translated I AM BECOMING …Jesus’s statements of… I and the Father are one…whatever you do (to others) you do to me…( which also by definition means whatever I do to myself I do to ‘him’)…his statement that the words he speaks are not his own but the Father’s…”this is my body broken for you” and if that is the ‘Father’ speaking and we are all one then the author is telling us ALL OF US ARE THE BROKEN BODY OF ‘GOD’/SOURCE/DIVINE CONSCIOUSNESS…experiencing an AMAZING MIND BOGGLING and continuous BECOMING and it is all driven by LOVE… for GOD/PURE CONSCIOUSNESS is LOVE. Then of course…if ‘God’ brought all things that ARE into existence from out of ‘Himself’ then what does that make ‘all things’? Of course there are many other verses and it was a gradual awakening with flashes of sudden illumination.
My quest has always been to answer the question my nine year old self asked when confronted with the verse…”Love the Lord your God with all your heart all your mind all your strength”…which was…Who is God? What is Love?How do I do that?
In the light of my meditations I wrote the following…
To love expansively, without limitations,without conditions.
To recognise the ‘I’ of oneself in every ‘Being’ God brings into the orbit of my ‘Being’ and to love that ‘Being’, to recognise within him or her every longing, desire, need, hope, potential that lies deep within the Being of my own self…
to love that Being without condition, without sentiment, without restriction…
to seek that Beings good, to nurture, encourage, heal, bless…
to LOVE..what joy!
To open my Being to soar beyond, unfettered by the limited perceptions of human senses!
What wondrous thing indeed to realise then, the ONE I am loving is the I of myself and in loving the I of my Self I am loving the I AM of creation! For the I AM of creation is LOVE…LOVE of ALL…for the ALL is of the ONE who is LOVE!
And thus we fulfil the LAW…
LOVE GOD
LOVE OTHERS
LOVE YOURSELF
Rhonda Lever April 2011
I also love Frank’s point…”BE STILL and know I AM god.”
I do not know if the Jesus Christ figure in the bible is an historical person or not. There is so much evidence that the events surrounding his birth-death-life-ministry are allegorical and a re-rendering of so many mythical figures that all point to spiritual truths about ourselves that I am inclined to say not. But I do not think it is important either. To take belief in an outside source as evidence of ‘being saved’ is shaky in the extreme, but If belief in an historical Jesus helps some one to understand Love as the true nature of Being…well, we all travel the road to enlightenment at different speeds:-) and we all are looking through a glass ‘darkly’ and will see things in as many variations and degrees of truth as we have potential arrangements of consciousness as pointed out by Brandon. All the more opportunity for the multi-facets of Love to be worked…patient, kind,humble,giving, selfless,understanding,forbearing, valorous,appreciative…endless…
Rhonda,
What an awesome poem! Thank you for sharing it on this blog for of all us to read! And there is much wisdom in your writing. Some of those same verses that you mention about God’s Oneness was the opening of the door for me, too. Just as you said, they were only slight flashes at first, but they got brighter as time went on. This is part of what separates the spiritual experience from the religious one.
I also agree with your statement about Christ. If he literally walked the earth 2000 years ago, what was his true message to us? What kind of knowledge and love would he have wanted us to spread? It certainly wasn’t religion.
Thanks again, Rhonda, I am sure that this comment will bless many people.
Namaste
Dare I say… I was meditating… and the exact picture of the Universe and the Brain cell was what I saw. I didn’t know it was actually a brain cell though! 😉
It all had to do with how we are taught to look outside of ourselves for the answer. How the Universe is so vast. It kept coming up how the Kingdom of God is within us and how every thing I need is already inside of me. It was then that I saw the picture. A snap shot for a moment. What is inside of us is so vast, complex and yet so simple. Why look outside for the Universe, when the Universe is already inside us.
The day after that happened. You posted this. I refrained from posting about it until now. Why now? Because I think it’s important for you to know. These “Confirmations” keep coming up at an accelerated rate for me lately.
May I say that is awesome ,Laurie! The increasing number of interested & interesting comments on these blogs are full of confirmation for us all. For me at least. So many people in so many places all over the globe ‘wakung up’ and connecting serendipitously. It’s like world wide neurons firing…not surprising since we are all One:-) Blessings!
YES!!! So True, Rhonda! 🙂
Hello! I came across your blog today – what a gem. I’ve ready several posts and kept wondering how you were defining “God” and hoping that a post would come to me wherein you offered your take. This one fits that bill : )
I grew up in a fundamentalist christian home going to church from the time I was an infant. Our family never studied the bible at home together, which certainly played a part in my lack of questioning. It wasn’t until my early 30s that I began to really read the entire bible for myself, beginning with the Tanakh. That’s when christianity began to unravel for me. It was totally incongruous with christian scripture. I was still locked in that fundamental mindset though. One of those people who took it all as literal, so I transitioned from fundamental christian to conversion to Orthodox Judaism. Not long after that process was underway, it too began to unravel.
In my studies, I began to come upon many things, including the awakening about consciousness, being the creator of our own reality, the all being one, etc…through an orthodox scientist’s talk about the creation story & Quantum Physics of all things. From then on, life has been the grandest of adventures which led be to your blog as well. It’s very thought provoking. It seems that you’re making the assertion that the entirety of Hebrew & Greek texts were written with a strictly allegorical intent. I disagree that they were intended as exclusively allegorical because it’s clear that Christian Israelites, Roman converts & even Rabbinic Jews (as evidenced by the Mishnah) of the age, accepted the bulk of it as literal.
I realize that storytelling was important in that time, but it seems unlikely that every bit of the scriptures were hidden tales of enlightenment. Perhaps what we’re doing here is taking what was written and gleaning from it our own esoteric meaning and interpretation, in order to gain something from the things we were taught, which is valid enough. The only thing that really matters is this moment and we have the ability to redefine & create this moment. What an exciting thing.
Thanks for sharing your insights.
Willow. Thanks for taking the time to comment. I understand your belief that not all scripture is allegorical, but you seem to believe that some (or maybe even most of it) is. That’s good enough. Be careful though by arguing all of it can’t be just because people in ancient times believed it to be literal. That proves nothing. Either way, the important thing is that we all see it wasn’t meant to be a literal book from beginning to end.
Thanks for sharing a little about your story, too. You are correct in saying that the Old Testament is incongruous with modern Christianity! I wish you the best and I hope you find other articles of interest here. Many blessings!
The Bible is allegory. I comparison of two things. Light,or dark. heaven, or hell,(state of mind). good, or evil. Demons, or angels. Yes we are all one and God is in,and through all things! The only thing that really is, is God. God is light(enlightenment) and no darkness(ignorance) at all.
So true, Shawn!
The Gospel of James, Thomas, and even 1 Thessalonians all have verses that speak of man as having 3 parts (Flesh, Soul, and Spirit). By comparing this thought to others found in various holy scriptures it is not a far leap to see that must two Crucifixions that occur during our souls life time. The first being the Crucifixion of the Flesh, which we are all striving for now, the second being the Crucifixion of the Soul, the individual you. This second Crucifixion would return the Spirit to God thus completing the cycle.
This is even supported by the Nicene Creed when it states that God is Three persons (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost). The Holy Ghost is in you now, the Son is what you become when you Crucify the Ego and ascend to the higher planes of consciousness, and the Father is the final stop on the journey.
My personal belief, which admittedly may still be clouded by past religious beliefs, is that the man Jesus was one who returned to the Father and then was shrouded in a new Soul and New flesh to teach us what was needed to strip away the flesh from the soul.
If we look at the Revelation of John, we see that there is a period called the Millennial Reign, where the Son will reign before the Father returns. This would be a glimpse into the next stage of the Souls journey, with the Father’s return representing the Soul’s Crucifixion and the final return to the Father.
Justin,
There are many people who also hold this belief. Whether it is completely accurate or not is certainly a lot closer to the truth than today’s traditional message. Blessings, my friend!