Metaphysical Look at the Sermon on the Mount Part 1

Many of you have asked me to consider leading a class on the metaphysical interpretation of the Bible.  Thus, I have decided to take this opportunity to make some of the Sunday Lessons "Bible Metaphysics 101".  This will be a series of talks as the material to cover is so broad in scope.  It will include Jesus, what he did and did not teach, the Beatitudes, some of his more profound statements, and lastly, what has become popularly known as "The Lord's Prayer".  The text for these lessons has been taken primarily from Emmett Fox's book "The Sermon on the Mount", notes from my advisor Rev. Robert Eagan, the Internet, and as always my own meditation, incites, and musings. I'm not sure at this point how many weeks it will take to cover this information; however, it will be interspersed with guest speakers, who will discuss a series of other topics in between. I don't want any of us to get on bible overload! Today we will discuss Jesus in more depth and the first two Beatitudes.

"The Sermon on the Mount" itself came about most likely because Jesus moved through the countryside teaching and healing. As he did this he collected an army of followers wherever he went. People were waiting to hear this unusual man, often just to rest in the peace of his presence, to be near this remarkable human being. Many people believe Jesus taught a system of theology but he did not. In fact, "there is no system of theology or doctrine to be found in the entire Bible", states Matthew Fox, " it simply isn't there." The theologies and doctrines you and I have been previously taught mostly came from  groups of men who lived hundreds of years after the death of Jesus.  Some people go so far as to say what we call Christianity today should in reality be called "Paulianity" after the teachings of the Apostle Paul. Paul, in fact, never actually met Jesus other than in a vision he claims to have had on the road to Damascas, where Jesus states to him only… "Saul, Saul why doest thou persecute me?"

The truth is Jesus' teaching is and was entirely spiritual and metaphysical (meaning beyond what we can see and prove conclusively). He never told us what to eat or drink or what to refrain from eating or drinking. He never said there was a need to carry out any ritual observances at certain times or seasons. Indeed the entire current of his teaching was anti-ritualistic and anti-formalistic. Let me share with you an example of what he was against. A modern Rabbi has estimated that in the time of Jesus the good Jew was to carry out not less than 600 observances in a day. Now, if he sleeps 8 hours at night, that works out that this dear man does something in the neighborhood of 37 different rituals i.e. praying, singing, washing, etc. in the remaining 16 hours of his day.

Never, ever did Jesus teach that God is a little old man sitting up in a place called heaven where the streets are paved in gold and angels sing all day. And lastly, he taught nothing about the "blood of the lamb" or salvation by believing in him. He never said that was our ticket to heaven .

O.K. now that I went into great depth about what Jesus did not teach, what did this incredible man have to say?

1. He explained the nature of God. He said "God is spirit "closer than breathing", "closer than hands and feet", in essence, God is in and available to each and every one of us at any moment of the day or night.
2. He told us that we were the children of God. Now this was a terminology that the people of his day could fully understand; for, to them to be a child of the king meant that they did not have to bow down or hide their face in the presence of the king as others did. It went beyond saying that they would inherit the kingdom. He was saying that God is approachable always and in all ways. (Now get the Moses burning bush, holy ground, turn your face, story out of your head for that was Hollywood at its best, not fact.)
3. He told us the meaning of life and death.
4. He showed us how and why we make mistakes, why we yield to temptation, and why we become sick and old and impoverished; but, most of all, he told us how to we may overcome these things, how we can bring health, happiness, and true prosperity into our lives, if we really want them.
5. He did teach what has become known as the Golden rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
6. He taught "As you sow, so shall you reap"....what many of us would refer to today as "Karma"
7. He taught "Love your neighbor as yourself" (two things here: neighbor is more than just the nice lady next door... it is everyone and "as" is a big word in that sentence often overlooked...  We are to love ourselves as well...and it’s not being selfish as many of us have been lead falsely to believe.
8. He taught us to love and to commune regularly with Mother Father God, Great Spirit, Allah, Grandmother, Grandfather regardless of how we name it, for our daily guidance.
9. He taught "Don't judge" (We know we are out of our hearts, out of Love, whenever we are judging for we are not at peace in those moments. We are in our heads, criticizing, spinning our wheels with usually unrealistic plans, causing only more chaos.)
10. He taught us to "go the extra mile" in understanding or helping another; however, he also taught us not to waste our time with persons who enjoy wallowing in their misery.... "Do not caste your pearls before swine."
11. The closest he came to ritual was "The Lord's Prayer" which as you all heard Martie reading this morning is a far cry from the one commonly read today.
12. He was against anything organized, any kind of church or church hierarchy.
13. He prayed as if his prayer had already been granted, as if he knew the true power of our own thoughts and words. He knew prayer was a science and an art and it was in the teaching of this science and this art that Jesus devoted the greatest part of his ministry. Don't miss that point. We pray not for God or Spirit to hear our words but for us to hear and say them with conviction. 
14. And lastly, that the thoughts that occupy our mind both conscious and unconscious, your secret place as Jesus called it, are molding our life.

"The truth is that the whole of our life's experience is but the outer expression of our inner thought," states Matthew Fox. And remember what I said in my talk "More thoughts on Healing" in Carolyn Myss's word's in her book, "Anatomy of the Spirit". "80% of our circuits must be in present time for alternative methods of healing to work effectively." This staying fully in present time, stops what I call "digging in" from happening. For example, Jesus said the moment we are aware of troubling news, turn to spirit in prayer, don't wait, pray, then let it go. You see, we have free will, but free will lies in our choice of thoughts. Let us suppose that you have just heard troubling news regarding a business venture, bad news about a relative, or disturbing news of a serious diagnosis that you have just been given. Many people in such a situation,  would possibly at first using our free will of thought saturate ourselves with painful disasterous scenarioes, worrying about them all day, rehearsing every possible outcome or potential complication. We might even start formulating plans of action. There may even be bitter resentment toward some of the people involved that we can't seem to get out of out of our thinking. Now, a student of the Jesus teaching would sooner or later start to drive all negative thoughts out of his mentality, consciously substituting positive affirmations and denials. However, damage in the subconscious mind had already been done "the digging in" had happened. Though we can easily change our conscious mind, it usually takes the average person a bit longer with a lot more hard work to get it out of our subconscious. If we had only remembered instantly upon having heard the news that "universal harmony is the true law of being not fear, if we had remembered that "All things work out for good for those who love or go to spirit", we would have avoided hours or days of worry.  I have friend's whose home had a major fire. They spent two years in a trailer as they remodeled their home.  It seemed at the time a disaster; however, later, when the insurance money came through and they had the beautiful home that they had always dreamed of owning, it was not a disaster. Now they look back on the fire as a blessing. There is divine order even, if we don’t at first see it. 

Where do we find all these teachings of Jesus? We find a large portion in the Beatitudes. The Sermon on the Mount opens with all eight of them. They are actually a prose poem in 8 verses complete in themselves and practically a general summary of the whole of Jesus's teachings. Now we can take them literally with a great deal of confusion, or we can take them interpretively and spiritually as we will do here. Now Jesus concerned himself exclusively with the teaching of general principles, and these general principles always had to do with mental states; for, he knew if one's mental states are right, everything else must be right as well. He knew as well that God is spirit and they that worship spirit will understand truth through spirit alone. Thus, the Beatitudes especially need to be taken and understood spiritually for full understanding.

The first Beatitude is written "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven". Here in the very beginning we have to take into account that certain English words used have an entirely different translation in Aramaic, the language of Jesus in which it was originally spoken. For example, an idiom in the Bible such as "pluck out your eye" meant something entirely different then than it does to us in a Western culture today. To "pluck out your eye" means get rid of your lust and greed so your life can be full and wholesome. It was never meant to be taken literally!! As well in this instance, "to be poor in spirit" in the Aramaic Eastern culture means to have emptied yourself of all desire to exercise personal self will; as well as, to have renounced all preconceived opinions in the whole hearted search for God. Now that's a mouthful. To make it more simple, a Buddhist might say it means "to be as an empty cup" for only an empty cup is capable of being filled. Carolyn Myss in her book "Anatomy of the Spirit" when discussing the 5th Chakra or sacrament of confession, states there are three stages of the growth of our will. The first will is to have essentially no will at all, never having the courage to say "No, I'm afraid that plan will just not work for me today." Ask yourself in this respect are you a doormat for others, a 5 by 7 rug, or wall to wall carpeting? Many of us are somewhere in the middle depending on who the person is who is asking the favor and the circumstances around the asking. We need or to always ask ourselves, "Do I really want to do this or is it out of guilt, pity or obligation?" If it is the latter, we’re still a rug! You see things done not out of unconditional love but out of the big three (guilt, pity, or obligation) build resentment later on... not a pretty sight. The second stage of will and the one many of us are in a fair bit of the time after some form counselling is called mature self will. It is having the courage to say no when we mean no and yes when we me yes. This is good; however, this as with most things can be taken to extremes. For example, we join a support group for abuse recovery and then stay attending for the next 20 years. It becomes our main topic of conversation, even to strangers. You see here the common word is "I", "my will". Once we had no will for so long then finally after perhaps weeks or years of therapy we take it back. It is then quite easy to use it as a power tool to control the environment. Now the third stage of will and the one we are all striving to attain is stating, "spirit, take my will, the will of my Christ consciousness, the will of my highest good, not my ego." and really meaning it. Finally we are trusting that we are always in the perfect place at the perfect time and life is unfolding exactly as necessary for the highest growth and development of all concerned. It means giving our will not over to another person or situation but to Spirit. Thus, to be poor in spirit means to have gotten rid of all your ego desires. It means to set aside all prejudices. It means you say in reality I know nothing for I truly can never have all the facts. (an aside, that in a nutshell is the first three lessons in "A Course of Miracles"). It means as well to eliminate from your being anything and everything that stands in your path to God. It means in practical terms that you put aside all spiritual pride, all educational degrees, all sentimental attachments... You become as I said before in that Buddhist tradition "an empty cup". Now, once again what is "the kingdom of heaven"? I can tell you it is not a place. It is the state of mind of true contentment and eternal peace, available to us at any moment....only thinking makes it so! Thus it could read "Blessed are those who are empty and open to spirit for they shall have true eternal peace."

And lastly I will briefly discuss today the 2nd Beatitude... "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted". This one is fairly straight forward though most of us are slow to take advantage of it.  "It is the will of God," states Jesus "that every person live in happiness and experience joy." Why is it that we humans for some strange reason seem to need some form of pain, physical, emotional, financial etc., to seek God? We seem to need some adversity in our lives to get us on the search in earnest. We seem to hesitate to turn to Spirit as if he/she is too busy to bother. Even those of us in the New Thought Movement or mystical traditions, who know God is Spirit in us and not a little old man up in the sky, still must hold some remnant of those old teachings drilled into many of us as children.   The key is to remember that praying changes our minds not God's. What did Jesus say, "God already knows what we need before we even ask?" Changing our minds and thoughts is what is needed for change to occur. That, as I said before, is the key! Jesus states it clearly, "As a man thinketh, so he is"... The metaphysical meaning "of comforted" is experiencing the presence of God, and we have already stated that is feeling eternal peace. Thus, "Experiencing the presence of God is the end of all mourning, pain, and sorrow".  If we go away today remembering only that, we have grown 100 fold. 

Namaste,

Barbara