Sunday Service Reading #3

ON PALM SUNDAY, the throng joyfully acclaimed Jesus Christ as he entered Jerusalem, casting palm fronds before him and singing, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! the Lord bless the king of Israel!” (John 12:13)

Jesus Christ had told the people, “The son of man must be lifted up.” His reference—so we are told—was to the mode of his impending crucifixion. Come persons on that occasion had asked, “Who is this son of man?”

Was Jesus a human being, merely? Those who, on Palm Sunday, called him king little realized the actual nature of his kingdom. He was far more than what they imagined. Yes, of course he ate, drank, walked, slept, and talked like others. His consciousness, however, was centered in infinity. Yes—again—he laughed like others: But his laughter expressed divine joy, not mere merriment. Again, he wept like them: But never with human grief. the tears he shed were for the sufferings of unenlightened human beings: Never were they shed in self-pity.

Jesus Christ was wakeful in God. Most people, by contrast, are asleep spiritually.

How strange to reflect that less than a week from that entry into Jerusalem—so joyfully acclaimed—he would be arrested, condemned, and crucified! Such is the bitter-sweetness of human existence: smiles of welcome one day—insults, even persecution the next. How few realize that Christ’s suffering would not be for himself, but for people’s ignorance—for those who had not yet understood the deeper reality that dwelt also in them!

Everyone is born “trailing clouds of glory,” as the poet Wordsworth put it, Even the meanest beggar has lived a story, or will eventually have lived it, more magnificent than the greatest epic ever written.

In the Bhagavad Gita, this dichotomy between the “son of man” and the inner “Son of God” is beautifully described. Sri Krishna, representing God in human form, reveals his true nature in infinity. In the eleventh chapter of the great scripture, his chief disciple Arjuna exclaims:

O Infinite Light!
Thy rediance, spreading o’er the universe,
Shines into the very darkest abyss!
Thy voice o’erwhelms the roar of cosmic cataclysms!
Lo! the myriad stars are Thy diadem;
Thy scepter radiates power everywhere!
O Immortal Brahman, Lord of all:
Again and again at Thy feet of Infinity
I lie in prostration before Thee!

MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Asha Praver's Service on this Subject from 4-5-09

VIDEO of Doctor Peter's Service on this Subject from 4-5-09

MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Doctor Peter's Service on this Subject from 4-5-09

MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Asha's Service on this Subject from 3-16-08

MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Bharat's Service on this Subject from 3-16-08

Longest Reading from the Book The Promise of Immortality
Who is This Son of Man?

A QUESTION ONCE ASKED OF JESUS by certain “people” (the Bible doesn’t specify who they were) draws the reader’s attention to an important distinction between Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and Jesus, the “son of man.” Their question was a response to a veiled prophecy he had made to the effect that he would be “lifted up”—in other words, “on the cross.” The people said, “We have heard out of the law that Christ abideth for ever: and how sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up. Who is this Son of man?” (John 12, Verse 34)

Paramhansa Yogananda explained that Jesus used the term, “son of man,” to refer to his physical body. On the present occasion, he spoke of the divine light, which radiated outward to the world from his physical presence in it. The light, he said, would be outwardly with them only “a little while [longer].” He urged his listeners, therefore, “Walk, while ye have [yet] the light, lest darkness come upon you.”

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was one in consciousness with the Infinite Lord. All human beings are potentially the same as he. The difference between him and us lies only in the fact that most people have yet to awaken to their divine reality. The law referred to in this passage signifies a truth far beyond anything most of them imagine. They think themselves to be only “sons of men.” Jesus, on the other hand, was conscious even as a human being of the indwelling Christ consciousness. He often demonstrated this awareness by his perfect knowledge of people’s inmost thoughts and of events distant from his physical body.

Jesus did not come to earth to amaze people with his greatness. His mission was to awaken them to their own potential greatness. All of us are, in our souls, the sons of God. To the extent that Jesus distinguished between himself and others, it was to remind them of their divine potential.[1]

In John 10 we read that the Jews “took up stones to stone him” for blaspheming. He had declared: “I and my Father are one.” He, however, turned the tables on them with his answer: “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, Ye are gods’?” He then told them to study the evidence: “If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe in the works: that ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.”

He went on to ask them: Why, if God has said, “Ye are gods,” do you say “of him whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest, for having said to you, I am the Son of God?” The difference between Jesus and other men was, as he emphasized here, one not of essence but of refinement of awareness. Most people are not awake to their own full truth, whereas Jesus, by the grace he had achieved through incarnations of self-dedication, had awakened in God.

In his Sermon on the Mount he told his listeners, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48) This supreme challenge was and still is incomprehensible to most people. There are concordances of the Bible that don’t even include it, fundamental to his message though it is. For people, drawing support from a self-justifying reading of the Bible, are convinced that all men, themselves included, are inherently sinful, and that only the suffering of Jesus on the cross can redeem them.[2] The New English Bible softens this passage to read: “You must therefore be all goodness, just as your heavenly Father is all good.” And The Revised English Bible states, “There must be no limit to your goodness, as your Father’s goodness knows no bounds.” No translator, however, can avoid the truth that Jesus wanted us to live in the divine way, which is to say, in God. And that is to say also, in perfect surrender of our ego-consciousness.

It is not that Jesus divorced his commandment to be perfect from the need to be good in a lesser, more human sense also. Indeed, the commandment follows upon advice to develop good spiritual attitudes: forbearance, patience, and love for one’s enemies. Even this counsel was given deeper significance, however, in the words that followed: “that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven.” He was saying, in other words, “Behave divinely, because your true nature is divine!” To be truly “children of God” is to become like Him—reflections of the Infinite Spirit. As human beings, we are merely the “sons (and daughters) of man.” It is when, in deep meditation, we achieve pure consciousness that we become cleansed of limitations and realize oneness with God. “Tat twam asi!” is the ringing statement in the Indian scriptures: “Thou art that!” God’s perfection is, potentially, our very own.

Mere death cannot strip us of limitation. The consciousness of unawakened beings passes after death through a “clearing process,” described by the ancient Greeks as Lethe, the River of Forgetfulness. The consciousness of an awakened master, on the other hand, is not identified with the vehicles through which it expresses itself. A master remains eternally Self-aware.

Earth-ensnared human beings return to the physical plane many times. Rarely do they remember even fleeting episodes from their past lives. Full memory, however, is retained on deeper-than-conscious levels of soul-consciousness. Every choice a person makes is influenced, far more than he realizes, by subtle impressions from the past: traumas, satisfactions, hopes, fulfillments, and disappointments—including especially his past reactions to them, which above all determine his present personality.

Only his lack of spiritual awareness prevents him from experiencing the perfect state of Self-realization, which Jesus and all true masters have attained. It was to mankind’s potential for this achievement that St. John spoke in his declaration, “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God.”

In oneness with God, relativities cease to exist. Past, present, and future are delusions. There is only the Timeless Now. As Jesus said, “Before Abraham was, I am.” (John 8:58) He was beyond temporal and spatial relativities. As he said also, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” (Matthew 18:20) Note his use here of the present tense: not “there shall I be,” but, “there am I.” Time and distance had no effect on the immediacy of his awareness.

St. Simeon, a great Hesychast saint of the Tenth Century (still known by his early epithet, “the New Theologian”), added that this passage meant also, “When two or three thoughts are gathered together in concentration on the Christ.” For the Christ presence to be cognized, the mind must be stilled and uplifted.

“Who is this son of man?” the people asked. The reality of Jesus was far more than they imagined. Yes, he ate, drank, walked, slept, and talked like others, but his consciousness was centered in infinity. Like others also, he laughed, but his laughter expressed divine joy, not mere merriment. Again, like others, he wept, but never with human grief; the tears he shed were for the sufferings of others, and were never shed in self-pity.

Thus, when “a certain ruler” addressed him, saying, “Good Master,” Jesus replied, “Why callest thou me good? None is good save one, that is, God.” (Luke 18:19) He wasn’t implying, “I, like all men, am a sinner.” Rather, what he meant was, “Don’t look to human beings for perfection. The credit for any good that man accomplishes belongs to God alone.” Human goodness is relative: It is “good” only to the degree that it manifests God.

Jesus Christ was awake in God. Most human beings, by contrast, are spiritually asleep. This distinction should be kept in mind as a protection against spiritual pride.

Religionists everywhere incline too easily to believe that their own religion is the only way. The best religion, however, is that alone which helps one to know God. This truth is universal. A clear instance of it may be seen in an episode in which John said to Jesus, “Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name; and we forbad him, because he followeth not with us.” Jesus replied, “Forbid him not; for he that is not against us is for us.’” (Luke 9:50)

Dogmatic Christians often cite another passage in support of their much narrower vision. It is a passage that does, in fact, seem at first to contradict the one above. “He that is not with me,” Jesus said, “is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.” (Matthew 12:30) His words—seldom quoted in their full context—are paraded triumphantly as proof that Jesus was saying that if people don’t accept him as their only Savior, they are “against” him and therefore, by definition, “against” God. When this passage is read in context, however, it supports the first one, and makes it clear that Jesus was referring not to himself personally, but to the eternal truth. The choice offered here was between divine and egoic fulfillment, not between acceptance of Jesus and non-acceptance.

This choice between divine and egoic fulfillment is absolute. In India there is a saying, “Life’s path is too narrow for both the ego and God to walk it together.” To choose one of these means to leave the other behind. To prefer earthly fulfillment to divine awareness is to reject the true happiness all men seek.

The above verse, when studied in context, provides a very different meaning of “he that is not with me is against me.” The words that follow make it clear that Jesus was not referring to himself, as a human being, but to the impersonal Holy Ghost. For the passage continues: “All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but [not that of] blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. And whosoever speaketh a word against the son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in the world to come.”

Why is this particular blasphemy the only unforgivable sin? It is because, as Paramhansa Yogananda explained, when we set ourselves against the Holy Ghost, we alienate ourselves from our own true being. Losing touch with that Self, we lose our inner peace, and condemn ourselves to perpetual restlessness of spirit. It isn’t God who condemns us: It is we who condemn ourselves. Free will is the birthright of every soul. There is only one way to wash away this supreme sin from our consciousness: We must of our own free will, in prayer and meditation, turn back to God. The process may be slow and difficult, but there is no other way.

To love Jesus truly is above all to love the truth for which he stood. “Why call ye me, Lord, Lord,” he asked once (with, one imagines, a hint of exasperation), “and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46) To love the truth does not mean formally to become a Christian. One may never have heard of Jesus Christ. Even so, if one loves the Truth which Jesus represented, he cannot but be “with him” in the deeper sense that Jesus Christ himself intended.

Jesus underscored his meaning in this passage by adding that to be against him as the son of man is, on the contrary, forgivable. For opposition to him as a human being doesn’t necessarily mean consciously to oppose the Divinity within him, and within oneself. Thus, Jesus could pray on the cross, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”

To reject the divine truth Jesus represented, however, is another matter altogether. Indeed, to reject the divine potential of anyone, no matter how unenlightened, is to reject one’s own divinity. This denial is related to the supreme sin of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, for there is only a veil of delusion separating us from others. Jesus said also, therefore, “Whoever calls his brother an outcast of God shall be in danger of hellfire.”

On another occasion he stated something to which Christians of dogmatic bent ought to pay careful heed, though this passage is, unfortunately, seldom quoted in the churches. “Other sheep I have,” he said, “which are not of this fold.” (John 10:16) Then, to make it clear that this “I” referred not to his human, but to his divine, Self, he continued, “Them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.” The “voice” of Christ is the mighty sound of AUM, the Holy Ghost, the divine “Word,” Sustainer of the entire universe. And “one fold” means the state of oneness with God.

On Palm Sunday, the throng joyfully acclaimed him on his entry into Jerusalem. They cast palm fronds before him, and sang, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! The Lord bless the king of Israel!” (John 12:13) How strange, to reflect that less than a week later he was arrested, condemned, and crucified! Perhaps some even in that throng participated in the historic tragedy that followed, and shouted with the mob, “Crucify him!” Such is the bitter-sweetness of human existence: smiles of welcome one day—insults the next. Christians today still suffer in that memory.

How many realize, however, that Christ’s suffering was not for himself, but for them and for all of us: for our rejection, through him, of the Christ who dwells in our own selves? Neither praise nor scorn, acclaim nor rejection could affect Jesus in his divine Self, the “Son of God.”

Palm Sunday was a joyful occasion, but it was not one of unalloyed joy. Mingled with the general mood of exaltation was a deeper mood of impending, stark pathos. To those who welcomed him it seemed he was entering the city to be acclaimed King of the Jews. He himself knew, however, and had hinted as much, that his “triumph” would be of a very different sort: tragedy, yes, but also an affirmation of spiritual over worldly “glory.” His was not to be an earthly crown, but opprobrium, condemnation, and crucifixion instead. In a symbolic sense, what his death showed was the destiny of every sincere seeker of God. Death, for Jesus, was indeed “kingship,” but of a transcendental nature. His absolute submission to God’s will demonstrated the victory of Spirit over matter.

All of us must make this choice, someday: God—or worldly fulfillment. The timing of the choice is forever ours. Until we make it, however, we doom ourselves to an existence that can never give us more of happiness than of sorrow, for it metes out both in equal measure until what we choose is God alone.

The lukewarm devotee always prefers compromise. Tepid, spiritually, he tries to convince himself that Jesus too was, in a sense, “worldly.” For didn’t he love the world? And shouldn’t we take him in every respect as our model?

Yes, of course we should: but foolishly? “Sons of man” like him? or “Sons of God”? He became human to help us to become one with Christ. To be truly Christian means to live inwardly as Jesus did: to love all, yes, but with soul-love, not with ego-consciousness.

People undervalue themselves. That is why they belittle one another. They scrutinize the greatest and the noblest for their faults, and mock any weakness they perceive, or imagine they perceive, in them. Do shortcomings in others justify shortcomings in ourselves? “Physician,” Jesus said, quoting an ancient proverb, “heal thyself!” (Luke 4:23)

People fear to acknowledge greatness in others, because subconsciously they feel that if they were to acknowledge true greatness (not tinseled fame), they would be forced to recognize their own potential greatness. This prospect, to most of them, is frightening! Far more comforting is it to view everyone and everything condescendingly, as if from the top of whatever little mound of achievement they themselves have managed to climb. “Sure, I know old Sam,” they’ll say; “People think well of him. But” (laughing) “have you ever seen him on the golf course? What a duffer!” Wouldn’t it be better to admire Sam for his virtues than to denigrate him for his shortcomings? What have a person’s superficial characteristics to do with his true character? Why not admire virtue of any kind open-heartedly? By denying greatness in others, we deny the potential for it in ourselves.

Every human being is born “trailing clouds of glory,” as Wordsworth put it. Even the meanest of us has lived, or will eventually have lived, a story more magnificent in scope than the greatest epic ever written. By comparison, those brief accounts set forth in the dramas of Shakespeare, Sophocles, Racine, and Kalidasa (in India) pale to insignificance. Were it possible to weave a tapestry of the voyage each of us makes in a saga of incarnations, it would display an adventure cosmic in its proportion and significance: anguishing often, no doubt, but as often delightful, wondrous, and thrilling: a sweeping quest for the divine treasure hidden at the center of our very being.

In how many ways on this long voyage do we err—often, how tragically! Even our successes seem so petty and pathetic at last—if only because so ultimately disappointing!—beside the triumph that awaits us. Painstakingly, through eons, we chisel away at our granite block of ego-consciousness until it finally reveals to us who we really are—who we always have been, in our souls.

Such was the supreme drama, imbued with the power of ages, of the life of Jesus Christ. It was a drama even greater than that single, wonderful incarnation we all know, terminated so dramatically by the fury of human ignorance. Jesus was the eternal soul who, after a myriad lives of trial and suffering, had “overcome.”[3]

The love of Jesus for mankind was infinitely generous and tender. Never sternly critical of human weaknesses, it was, rather, an affirmation of life: of life’s eternal hope and promise. The love Jesus bore all human beings called them to hold God at the center of their existence. It was an example to live under all circumstances in His joy.

As we imagine that throng on Palm Sunday, it is easy to visualize him also smiling in response to their acclamation. Inwardly, however, how sad he must have been, seeing by what a wide margin the majority of them had missed the meaning of his life!

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem!” he had once cried, gazing down upon the city. “How often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!

“Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me, until the time come when ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.” (Luke 13:34,35)

It is indeed right to enjoy life, but with God’s joy. And it is not wrong to grieve, but with God’s sorrow. Paramhansa Yogananda explained that God does sorrow, through our sorrows. In God’s sorrow, however, there is also the compassion born of a deeper joy. What God grieves for most of all is man’s ignorance of His love. Christ’s sorrow was rooted in love, not in self-concern.

Some of the early Christian Gnostics distinguished so austerely between Spirit and matter that they denied everything material, including the Crucifixion itself. In that denial, they failed to address the question: Why did Jesus weep for Jerusalem? In speaking of the tragedy of the Crucifixion, they asked, “What was there to weep about? Jesus wasn’t his physical body!” Jesus, however, in the fullness of perfection, accepted also man’s limited understanding. To him, the world was both real and unreal—real, as dreams are real to those who are asleep; unreal, to one who is awake.

It may seem self-contradictory that great masters—in view of their complete non-attachment to the world—should also affirm human life joyously, and weep in sympathy for those who grieve. A fully liberated master, however, is equally at home in the Spirit and in the mist-lands of delusion. His consciousness can never be tainted. Since to him the world is God’s dream, there is nothing for him to cling to; nothing to renounce.

In the Bhagavad Gita, the dichotomy between the “son of man” and the “Son of God” is beautifully described also. Sri Krishna, who represents God in human form, reveals his true nature as infinite and omnipresent. In the eleventh chapter of this great scripture his disciple Arjuna exclaims:

Arjuna, overwhelmed by the divine majesty, begs forgiveness for having—so audaciously, as it now seems to him—considered the Lord his beloved friend and counselor. Touchingly, then, he concludes: “Oh, let me behold once again Thy human form, so forever dear to me!”

Who is this bewildering, this irresistible, this unfathomable being, this divine son of man? He is, in a sense, just as he appears to be: a divinely radiant, inspiring human being, forever seeking to draw us toward our own divine destiny. But He is infinitely more than that also: beyond time, space, and form—the Lord of infinitesimal atoms and of vast galaxies alike, the Secret Power behind everything in the universe, both cosmic and mundane!

[1]This is an important distinction—one that priests and spiritual teachers and counselors ought especially to bear in mind. For they often tend to belittle themselves in the hope of establishing a sympathetic bond with others. Humility, however, is not self-abasement! It is self-forgetfulness. The duty of the sincere servant of God is not to emphasize his distance from Christ, but to attune himself with the Christ as a means of rising above his own shortcomings. A sincere effort to be Christlike is very different from boasting success in the attempt! It may sometimes be right to admit that one is still distant from the goal. (Humility is also self-honesty.) To over-emphasize this distance, however, amounts to an affirmation of failure. Worse still, it may convey to those one is counseling the despairing message: “What hope, then, have any of us of transcending sin?”

Indeed, if we are nothing but sinners, we have all the excuse our egos need to go right on living in sin!

[2]There is an obvious question they might ask themselves: Has their belief prevented them from further sinning?

[3]See Revelation, 3:21.