tgalten

So is it necessary that we put Jesus somehow above ourselves? If he actually existed in history (and I tend to believe he did not and is an entirely mythical figure - a sort of Jewish answer to the Egyptian Osiris) and was enlightened he certainly would not endorse Christianity. If, as I believe, he is a mythical figure, then he symbolizes transformation of consciousness. In either case, we must look within, not without, for salvation. I am that. Tat tvam asi. It is that simple.

The pronoun "I", wherever it is used, refers not to an individual human body/mind organism, but to the One Self, Pure Consciousness, God. Enlightenment is simply the realization of this truth and the subsequent dis-identification from the illusory individual self and identification with the One (also known as God). Certainly the One Self playing the role of Jesus had this realization of itself as, through the body/mind known as Jesus, it said "I and the father are One". Again, this was not the realization by a person, but the realization of the Self by and through an apparent person. God

On one of Bishop Spong's recent question and answers, someone asked him "What is God?", stating that her granddaughter has asked he this question. Rev. Spong's admirable answer was that no one can say who or what God is. While I believe this is true at a certain level, I am not quite so modest about what we can say about God as is Bishop Spong. Borrowing here from Rev. Spong's response to the question asked him, I strongly endorse his statement that God is the "ground of being", using Tillich's famous definition. And it is here that I believe, with all due respect, that we can go a