This episode explores the final section of the Sermon on the Mount. It has taken me several months to go through Jesus’ famous teaching section by section. I hope that you have been able to see that Jesus was teaching the nondual reality that he called the Kingdom of God. I am considering revising and editing the transcripts of these talks and putting them into a book format. Right now it has the tentative title: The Sermon on the Mount: A Nondual Interpretation.
Jesus ends his longest and most famous teaching by warning us to be careful of those who would misinterpret his teachings to promote their own agenda. In other words he advises us to use discernment when it comes to spiritual teachers.
Discernment may at first seem like dualistic activity. In a sense it is, since it distinguishes one from another, which are two. But all is one; the false teacher and true teacher are all expressions of this one reality. Yet some teachers point to the Kingdom of God, Nondual Reality, better than others. That is what Jesus is talking about in this section. So it is nondual. So I am calling this nondual discernment.
Jesus uses a series of metaphors to warn us about those who would distort his message of the Holy Reality that he calls the Kingdom of God. First he uses the now famous image of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. He says, “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.” In other words some teachers appear harmless, but in reality they are anything but harmless.
Prophet is another term for spiritual or religious teacher. There are true teachers and false ones. Jesus is instructing us to use discernment when it comes to spiritual teachers. Jesus specifically had in mind people like the Pharisees and Sadducees, the scribes, teachers of the law and chief priests of his day. They all considered themselves to be guardians of divine truth, but they ended up banding together to have Jesus executed for teaching what he said on the Sermon on the Mount. They were wolves in sheep’s clothing. They did not even know they were wolves. They thought they were protecting people from Jesus, whom they considered a blasphemer.
Unfortunately that is exactly what has happened in Christianity. The leaders in Christianity today actually speak against the original message of Christ and consider it blasphemy. The nondual message of Jesus was turned into the dualistic religion called Christianity by Christian leaders. This pattern happens in all establishment religion: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, or any other ism.
There is the message of the Lamb, the One Nondual Reality, and there is the message of the wolf. The fox is guarding the henhouse, to use another image. The lamb is on the cross, and the wolf is on the throne. Jesus instructs us to discern one from the other. Pay attention when religious leaders get close to the throne. They are the court prophets, who are false prophets and wolves in sheep’s clothing.
The second metaphor Jesus uses is fruit trees. Jesus says, “You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.”
How do we discern true spiritual teachers from false? Jesus tells us to look at the fruit. Teachers who are infatuated with money, sex, and power are wolves in sheep’s clothing. If a church or denomination or spiritual community is repeatedly involved in scandals involving sexual misconduct and financial wrongdoing, then you can be sure it is rotten at the core. If it is involved in cover-ups and deception, there is deceit at the root. It is not a healthy tree. If a leader is always asking for money, that person is serving Mammon. It doesn’t matter if the person is a megachurch pastor or a Hindu guru. Bad fruit indicates a rotten tree.
Jesus goes on to remind us that it does not matter if they say they follow Jesus or even if their ministry is accompanied by miracles. Every religion has their miracles. The court magicians of Pharaoh’s court imitated the miracles of Moses. Truth is not about special effects. It is about living consciously as an expression of God. Waking in the Way, in the Tao of Christ.
Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”
In the Christian tradition, this means it doesn’t matter how much a person insists they are a Christian. It doesn’t matter whether they call Jesus, “Lord, Lord!” What matters is whether they are following Jesus. That is why I focus on the words of Jesus and the example of Jesus rather than later teachers. None of the 2000 years of Christian tradition that has accumulated around the figure of Jesus matters. They add nothing to Christ. The creeds and confessions of faith are sideshows. All these ideas, which the church now insists is essential to Christianity, are not essential to being a follower of Jesus.
A few weeks ago the church I attend received some new members. As part of the initiation ceremony the prospective members stood in front of the congregation. The Apostle’s Creed was read, and they had to publicly profess that they believed the Apostle’s Creed. This ancient creed has a lot of stuff in it that Jesus never mentioned. For example, that Jesus was God’s only Son, that he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, that he descended into hell and ascended into heaven. This creed talks about believing in the holy catholic church, communion of saints, resurrection of the body.
Most churches – not just mine but nearly all churches – have some a set of beliefs that members have to believe in order to be considered a Christian. They are listed in catechisms and creeds. But Jesus did require a set of beliefs in order to be his follower. He did not teach or believe most of the doctrines in the Apostles Creed, which less the later creeds. This is why for the last five years I was a pastor I did not require anyone to believe doctrines to join the church. I just invited people to follow Jesus.
Doctrines and beliefs do not add anything to Jesus’ message. In fact they take away from it. Requiring people to believe a set of doctrines is like putting a bushel basket over a lamp. The Kingdom of God is not about dogma. It is about the Way of Jesus. We are to discern between unnecessary filler and the core teaching of Jesus Christ.
To end his sermon Jesus uses one final metaphor. He says, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
Jesus is telling us to ground our lives on his words, like a builder building his house on a rock foundation. On the one Rock of Nondual reality rather than the many grains of sand of duality. One of my sons is a carpenter. He builds houses in NH. He recently built his own timber frame house with lumber cut from his own property. He did all the carpentry himself but he hired someone to put in the foundation. He made sure it was someone he knew that had worked with and knew what he was doing. That is because it does not matter how well the house is built if the foundation is not solid.
Each spring we spend a few weeks in Florida. This year we saw the damage caused by Hurricane Ian. Up and down our beach we saw houses in ruins that were destroyed by the ocean surges. I talked to one man whose house survived intact but whose neighbor’s house was totaled. He said the difference was the foundation. When it comes to spiritual teachers we need to use discernment. I have found the words of Jesus to be a firm foundation.
That is it for today. I think I am going to take a break from recording episodes for a while in order to concentrate on putting together the book of the nondual teachings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. Maybe not. I never really know what will happen until it happens. So we will both wait and see. Until next time, grace and peace to you.