The Nondual Gospel of the Jesus

What if we had a gospel written by Jesus himself? Unfortunately there is no evidence that Jesus wrote anything. If we can’t have a gospel written by Jesus, wouldn’t it be wonderful to at least have a gospel written from the perspective of Jesus? 

Lots of celebrities today use “ghost writers” to tell their autobiographies. Would it be great to have a ghost writer or should I say “Spirit writer,” write an autobiography of Jesus? A gospel from the perspective of Jesus! 

That is the project that I am undertaking next: “The Gospel according to Jesus.” More specifically the Nondual Gospel of Jesus or the Gospel of the Nondual Jesus, since I am convinced that Jesus was a teacher of what is called nonduality. In this episode i describe the rationale and the method of this project. 

Transcript

The Nondual Gospel of the Jesus

What if we had a gospel written by Jesus himself? Think about it for a moment. The gospels we have in the New Testament are third hand information. None of the canonical gospels – or non-canonical gospels for that matter – where written by the Man himself. It is likely they were not even written by people who knew Jesus or heard him speak, in spite of the names attached to them. They were written in the latter part of the first century in a language that Jesus did not speak. We only have a few words scattered here and there in the gospels in Aramaic, which was Jesus’ native tongue. 

Of the four gospels, two of them do not even pretend to be written by apostles. Mark and Luke never met the historical Jesus. They were disciples of the apostle Paul, not Jesus. Paul himself never met Jesus, although he says he met the risen Lord in a vision years after his crucifixion. From his writings it is clear that Paul is unaware of what Jesus taught. The religion called Christianity is based more on the teachings of Paul than the teachings of Jesus. 

Matthew and John were disciples of Jesus, but they did not write the gospels that bear their names. The books themselves never make that claim. The titles and authorships were assigned to the books in the second century long after they were written. Furthermore there is strong internal evidence that Matthew did not write the gospel that bears his name. For example, the Gospel of Matthew copies the story of Matthew/Levi’s call to be a disciple word for word from Mark’s gospel. Is that something a firsthand witness of the even would do? Wouldn’t he tell that momentous event in his own words?

John’s gospel has the strongest connection to an apostle, but it states explicitly that it was not written by the apostle. The closing sentences of the book say the author based it on the apostle’s testimony, which is more than the other gospels say.  That is assuming that the “Beloved Disciple” mentioned throughout the book of John is John. It never actually says that explicitly.

So the four NT gospels are third hand or second hand accounts at best. When studying these gospels it becomes clear that the gospel writers do not really understand the words of Jesus they have gotten from their sources. They are repeating oral traditions and perhaps written accounts by others, who themselves did not fully understand what Jesus was talking about. In the gospels Jesus continually berates his disciples and other listeners for lack of faith and being “foolish ones and slow of heart.” 

So the gospels we have were written by people who did not know Jesus or understand his message. Wouldn’t it be something to have a gospel written by Jesus! There is no evidence that Jesus ever wrote anything more than scribbles in the sand when he was contemplating the fate of the woman caught in adultery. Those were probably doodles and not words. There was a good chance that Jesus was illiterate, as far as writing is concerned. He could read. We see him reading the scriptures in the synagogue, but it was common for people in that day to learn to read but not to write. Writing materials were expensive and were limited to the use of professional scribes.

So Jesus and his apostles (with the exception of Levi/Matthew, who was a tax collector and needed to keep records) were likely unable to write. If we can’t have a gospel written by Jesus, wouldn’t it be wonderful to at least have a gospel written from the perspective of Jesus himself? Lots of celebrities today use “ghost writers” to tell their autobiographies. Would it be great to have a ghost writer or should I say “Spirit writer,” write an autobiography of Jesus? A gospel written from the perspective of Jesus! That is the project that I am undertaking next: “The Gospel according to Jesus.” More specifically the Nondual Gospel of Jesus or the Gospel of the nondual Jesus, since I am convinced that Jesus was a teacher of what is called nonduality. 

That is what I am now doing. I am writing a gospel in the manner that the original gospels were written, using sources just like Luke admitted using. This gospel is written in the first person rather than the third person. Written as if Jesus were telling the story. It explores what Jesus was thinking and feeling as he carried out his ministry. It is a way to get into the mind of Christ. 

Is this a valid thing to do? I think it is. I think we can know the mind of Christ. The Bible says so. I appeal to the words of the apostle Paul. When his apostleship was questioned, he appealed to the inspiration of the Spirit of God and of the Spirit of Christ. He writes: “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.” I am writing from that mind, as far as I can discern it. 

It is a nondual gospel. It is clear to me that Jesus was a teacher of what today is called nonduality. “I and the Father are one,” he taught. That is the awareness that came to him at his baptism when the heavens opened, and the Spirit enveloped him and he heard God tell him he was his Son, meaning the same nature as God. He proclaimed this experience to others using the terms Kingdom of God, Kingdom of Heaven or Kingdom of the Father. 

That was his designation for nondual awareness, what I call unitive awareness. This was the original gospel of Jesus Christ, which later was turned into a theology by the apostle Paul and into a Christian religion by the early church fathers. When we enter into the Kingdom of God, as Jesus did, then we share the mind of Christ. We have the same consciousness. As Paul says, “We have the Mind of Christ.” The Mind of Christ is unitive awareness or nondual awareness.

Reading the gospels with the Mind of Christ – from unitive awareness – we see the gospel narrative and teachings in a new light. We can feel what Jesus was feeling. We can imagine what Jesus was thinking. We understand what Jesus meant and why he did the things he did. We can read the gospels from the perspective of the one who lived it rather than a third party observer. That is what I am attempting to do in this new project, which will eventually be a new book. The working title is “The Gospel According to Jesus.” 

I am writing a gospel like Matthew and Luke wrote their gospels. It is well-known in New Testament scholarship that when Matthew and Luke were writing their gospels they used sources. Luke says that explicitly at the start of his gospel. By comparing the three synoptic gospels we can see that they used the Gospel of Mark as their primary source and framework. I am following their example. 

It is also theorized that Matthew and Luke drew upon another source for many of the sayings of Jesus. It was a collection of sayings of Jesus with no narrative. Scholars have given this source the name Q from the German word for Source, Quelle. (This Q Nothing to do with Q of the modern conspiracy theory Q Anon). 

No one has yet discovered a copy of this hypothetical Q document. But it turns out that the Gospel of Thomas found among the Nag Hammadi Library is exactly such a gospel of the sayings of Jesus without a narrative framework. The Gospel of Thomas is just as old if not older than the canonical gospels, and it has an apostle’s name Didymos Judas Thomas attached to it.  The Gospel of Thomas is a nondual gospel. The sayings of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas focus on the unitive awareness more than any of the other gospels. For these reasons I am utilizing Thomas as one of my sources, my Q, along with the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

For the next couple of months I am going to be focusing on this project. So I may not be posting as many podcasts or videos. I may share parts of the draft in my podcast and videos. I am not sure yet. If I share some of the chapters here in this venue, I invite anyone with insights to give me feedback. So that is my plan. Grace and peace to you.