The Sermon on the Mount is about how to live the nondual life. In this episode I explore Jesus' teaching found in the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Matthew about spiritual transparency - making the two one, the outer like the inner, the upper like the lower, and male and female into a single one. Jesus taught nonduality and how to live the nondual life.
The Sermon on the Mount is about how to live the nondual life. In this episode I explore Jesus' teaching found in the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Matthew about spiritual transparency - making the two one, the outer like the inner, the upper like the lower, and male and female into a single one. Jesus taught nonduality and how to live the nondual life.
Making the Inner like the Outer: Living a Nondual Life
Religious people tend to concentrate on behavior. That usually takes the form of defining proper moral conduct in terms of commandments, rules and ethical principles. Often times they are codified into laws that are imposed on society and enforced by penalties. Think Ten Commandments as well the American obsession with legislation. We think passing a law will fix anything.
Religious progressives are very concerned with speech - using the proper language for others and for God. This is moral behavior applied to speech. Even so-called “spiritual but not religious” folk are concerned with actions in the form of which spiritual practices are best.
The religious people of Jesus’ day were no different. The scribes and Pharisees were rule-makers and rule-enforcers. They were biblical literalists who spent their time pouring over the scriptures to discern the right and wrong things to do and say. The priests and Sadducees were obsessed with religious ceremonies as part of the sacrificial system of the temple. Pharisees and Sadducees were focused on behavior. For that reason they had a difficult time with Jesus, who had a unique approach to spirituality.
Jesus hung around with sinners and rule-breakers and the unclean, people like tax collectors and prostitutes. Jesus was ostracized and criticized by religious people for it. Furthermore Jesus broke biblical commands like Sabbath-keeping – one of the Top Ten - and rules of ritual cleanliness, and consequently was accused of not obeying the Bible. The religious people went so far as to call Jesus a blasphemer whose power came from Satan.
Jesus had equally harsh words for the religious people of his time. He called them hypocrites and children of the devil. He said they were clean on the outside but filthy on the inside. He said, “You Pharisees are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and wickedness!” He said, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside, but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of uncleanness.”
Religious people focus on the outside. Jesus focused on the inside. Specifically he focused on making the outside like the inside. What we would call today being transparent, the opposite of hypocritical. He also talked about making the below like above. “Thy kingdom come, they will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
According to the Gospel of Thomas one day Jesus noticed some babies nursing. He said to his disciples, "These nursing babies are like those who enter Kingdom." They said to him, "Then shall we enter the Kingdom as babies?" Jesus said to them, "When you make the two one, and when you make the inner like the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female, when you make eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter the Kingdom."
Jesus was all about tearing down the barrier between opposites, between dualities, between inside and outside. The Kingdom of God is within you, he said. But he also said you are in it. It is all around you. When we see that directly – the inner is the outer, the above is the below, then we see the Kingdom of God. You could say that we enter the Kingdom of God. Although if the Kingdom is already within and without, then you were never really outside of the Kingdom of God. It is about transcending the barriers of duality, the division between heaven and earth, us and others, us and God.
How does this translate into everyday living? Jesus talked about this in the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount is about how to live the nondual life. He uses a number of examples, but starts off with the big example: murder.
Jesus said: “You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘You shall not murder,’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be answerable to the court.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be answerable to the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be answerable to the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.”
He was addressing the Pharisees and their moral law. He was saying it is not about the outer, it is about the inner. Get the inner right and the outer will follow. As he says elsewhere, “Out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.” You could equally say that out of the overflow of the heart the body acts. Then he addressed the Sadducees and their ceremonial law:
“Therefore, if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering. Come to terms with your accuser quickly, while you are with him on the way to court, so that your accuser will not hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer, and you will not be thrown into prison. Truly I say to you, you will not come out of there until you have paid up the last quadrans.”
Here is he saying that one’s relationship with God is connected to one’s relationship with others. You cannot separate them. They are two sides of the same coin. You cannot have one without the other. Make the outer like the inner and the inner like the outer and everything is alright.
Unfortunately some people today read Jesus’ words and obsess about their inner life. So instead of being obsessed with every little sin they might be doing, they become obsessed with every sinful thought and desire they are thinking and feeling. Jesus was trying to rid people of the guilt and people turn his words into a way to load on even more guilt! That is how messed up some forms of Christianity are.
Nondual living is about breaking down barriers. It is about making the two one. Nonduality. Break down the barrier between outer and inner, upper and lower, and even male and female! Jesus says, “when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female … then you will enter the Kingdom." Jesus’ words about breaking down sexual distinctions were radical in his day and radical in ours.
These days the Christian Pharisees and Sadducees are all about keeping the distinctions between male and female - separating, defining and enforcing gender roles. Nondual living is about transcending the dualistic distinctions that most people are obsessed with – including male and female. When one sees that all is one, when one has a shift in awareness and sees that Reality is one, then everything changes.
Yet everything remains the same. Jesus even applies this to our perception of the body. Jesus says, “when you make eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter the Kingdom." This is a parallel to the Zen saying: “Before enlightenment, mountains were mountains and rivers were rivers. After enlightenment, the mountains were not mountains and the rivers were not rivers. Then mountains were mountains again and the rivers were rivers again.”
It reminds me also of the Zen saying, "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.” Everything changes and everything is the same. In nondual awareness we still need to live and function in the world with bodies and our mental understanding – our images - of the world. We still need to act morally in the world. We live from nondual reality and within nondual awareness.
We see that there is no distinction between inner and outer. Anger on the inside is murder on the outside. Harboring resentment toward someone is harboring resentment toward God. When you are labelling someone you are labeling yourself, for we are one. When we are mistreating our neighbor, we are mistreating God. So get right with your neighbor and we are right within ourselves and with God. That is true worship. Anything less is hypocrisy.
It is about making the two one. Seeing that the two are always one. The other is you. Whether that other is your friend, your neighbor, your enemy or God. When the two are one, then heaven comes to earth. The Kingdom of God arrives. Inner and outer are joined. Male and female are one. Above and below, upper and lower are one. That is enlightenment. That is liberation. That is salvation. That is forgiveness. That is the Kingdom of God.