God and the World - Part 9

[Guest guest]

Dear All,

 

We concluded Part 8 with:

 

(P.167) Jesus, on the other hand, manifests the infinite God in historic time

and place and in his historic death, dying on the cross. There are many ancient

myths of the god who dies and rises again but these are symbolic figures and

their meaning is deep but different. Jesus' death, on the other hand, is not

simply symbolic. He was an historic person, and the descriptions we have of his

suffering and death, in the four different accounts in the Gospels, are given in

minute detail. On that historic death and on the resurrection the whole

Christian faith centres. The experience of the disciples after the death of

Jesus, that the body was not to be found in the tomb and Jesus' appearances to

them, convinced them that he was risen from the dead. They understood that,

unlike Lazarus who was raised from the dead but simply carried on with his

limited life in this world, Jesus was alive for evermore, transcending this

world. What this means is that in the death and resurrection of Jesus the matter

of this world was transformed. In other doctrines, in other great faiths, matter

is often conceived simply as an appearance and the appearance disappears when we

have reached the one reality. But in the Christian understanding the matter of

the universe is transformed. The atoms, the molecules, the cells of Jesus' body,

which are part of this cosmic energy, were changed. Matter is a temporary

condensation of energy and that structure of energy which made up the body of

Jesus on the cross was transformed into a new structure. It maybe suggested that

in the resurrection that structure of energy became a psychic body, which is a

more subtle body. His body was first of all what is called a gross body which

anyone could recognise, and then it became a subtle body, which could not always

be recognised. This subtle body could appear and disappear, as we know from the

Gospel narratives. Finally he becomes a spiritual body at the Ascension. (P.168)

He transcends matter at both the gross and the subtle levels and enters the

spiritual level and, with that transformation, the matter of this universe is

taken up into the Godhead. That is the Christian mystery. It is amazing when we

begin to grasp it, that the matter which exploded in the so-called Big Bang

fifteen or even twenty billion years ago at that point was finally transfigured.

In fact the transfiguration has been going on all through history and we

ourselves are involved in this transformation of matter, as consciousness is

working on matter. The Christian understanding is that in Jesus consciousness

finally took possession of matter, and this means that matter was spiritualized.

In him the matter of the universe was, in other words, made totally conscious

and became one with God, in the Godhead.

 

A New Vision of Reality (Western Science, Eastern Mysticism and

Christian Faith), Pg.167-168

Bede Griffiths

Templegate Publishers - Springfield, Illinois

ISBN 0-87243-180-0

 

Here now is Part 9.

 

Enjoy!

 

violet

 

 

God and the World - Part 9

 

(P.168) It is also important to emphasise that the soul of Jesus did not

disappear. In the view of Shankara and so many others the 'jivatman' disappears

at death. You simply realise yourself in the total reality and there is no

'jiva', no individual, any more. But the soul of Jesus, that unique Jew of the

first century with all his personal characteristics, is eternal in the Godhead.

It is not that he disappears into the Godhead. Rather, both the body (soma) and

the soul (psyche) are taken up into the spirit (pneuma) in the transcendent one

and are totally transfigured in the One. This is beyond our comprehension but we

can perhaps try to conceive how it takes place.

 

We see that in Christ the world of space and time is not annihilated; it does

not disappear but it is transfigured, and that is precisely what St Paul means

by the New Creation. The New Creation is this present creation transformed into

the spiritual creation, matter no longer obeying the present laws which, as we

know, are related only to this particular stage in evolution. All material laws

are simply stages in evolution. At the inorganic level there are certain laws

operating, and then new laws come into being as the earliest living creatures

emerge. (P.169) Later, new laws develop pertaining to the animal level and,

later still, other new laws develop pertaining to human persons. The next stage

is the transcendence of finite being, as we enter into the divine consciousness

and into the divine mode of being. That is the New Man of St Paul, which is also

the heavenly Man and can be related, as we saw, to the perfect Man of the Muslim

tradition and the 'purusha' of the Hindu. But there is this great difference

here in Christianity, that the individual human being of Jesus does not

disappear in the Ultimate but rather is fully realised. As with Kashmir Shaivism

and Mahayana Buddhism, the Christian tradition recognises interrelationship in

the Absolute. Shankara denied any relationship or differentiation in the

Absolute. For him the Absolute is 'saccidananda', pure being, pure consciousness

and pure bliss, with no differentiation whatever. Kashmir Shaivism, on the other

hand, maintains the differentiation into Shiva and Shakti which we have

discussed, and the 'spanda', the pulse or stirring of will between them which is

self-conscious within the One. The One is totally one without duality, yet there

is also differentiation. This is expressed in the gospel when Jesus says, " I am

in the Father and the Father is in me. " (John 14:11) If Jesus had been an

'advaitin' he would have said, " I am the Father " or " I am God. " Jesus never says

that. In saying, " I am in the Father and the Father in me " , " I know the Father

and the Father knows me " , " I love the Father, the Father loves me, " Jesus is

affirming total interpersonal relationship.

 

It is very significant indeed that physics now sees the whole universe as a web

of dynamic interrelationships. When we come to the human person, our lives are

also a network of interrelationships. At the human level the child is related to

the mother and then to father, brothers and sisters, friends and so on, in a web

of relationships. The question is, do these relationships disappear in the

ultimate? (P.170) In this Christian understanding there are relationships in the

ultimate and Jesus himself expresses this by saying, " I am in the Father and the

Father in me " , and also when he prays " that they may be one as thou in me and I

in thee, that they may be one in us. " (John 17:21) Jesus' prayer is that as he

is in the Father in his personal relationship, so we also may be in him and he

in us, which means that we also enter into that interpersonal relationship

within the Godhead.

 

A New Vision of Reality (Western Science, Eastern Mysticism and

Christian Faith), Pg.168-170

Bede Griffiths

Templegate Publishers - Springfield, Illinois

ISBN 0-87243-180-0