How cool is Jesus?
I’m not here to argue if Jesus walked the earth or, as Kanye put it, argue about his facial features. I’m here to embrace the essence of this divine being and share my thoughts on how cool this dude was.
For the record. I am biased. The most symbolic image of human sacrifice is inked on my body, etched as a brain tattoo, and stitched in the helix bonds of my DNA as a way of navigating through this thing called life.
To give this story context, I will extract a narrative from the “power of now dude,” Eckhart Tolle, who gives nourishment to the thought of “essence.”
The true meaning of Faith is power, and “if you have faith” means if you access the power that lies beyond all phenomena, you access the source of the life. If you find access to that, it means you have faith. So, faith means sensing in yourself the power of life itself, which is not of the person; it is deeper, it is the power of consciousness itself. Sensing that in yourself, and when you connect with that, you realise it’s not so much that you connect with it (consciousness), it’s the essence of who you are, so having faith is being fully who you are in your essence.
The way to that is to go beyond the noisy mind, into the dimension, into alive stillness, and you will touch the source.
To do this, you must surrender your personality. The reason being, is that the personality includes the thinking mind. It is a fact that the thinking mind is abundant in our personality, but it acts as a closed door because, with a heavy personality, you cannot go any deeper. The personality acts as the stopper.
You have two aspects as a human being, said the Russian spiritual teacher, George Gurdjieff. You have personality and essence, and most people in the world have a strong personality, but very little in the way of essence coming through.
Essence is who you are beyond the personality. Occasionally, there’s an enormous amount of essence in rare human beings with very little personality.
My mind was twisted and as I tried to loosen the bonds of my strained sensory neurons, they were just tightening. What were these two spiritual titans trying to say, and what did this have to do with my thoughts on Jesus?
The writing process is finding sense in the deep. I’ve never scuba dived. I’ve never been in a submarine, but from the evidence I’ve seen from those that do that kind of deep work, it’s pretty murky and you will need to lean into your faith of the unknown, go deeper because it’s always worth it when you trust the process.
Unknowing is better than believing and Faith is about being open to what reality is — Alan Watts
Agnostia — Greek for unknowing — the highest form of faith. This is where the word agnostic came from. By definition, agnostic refers to “a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God.”
Am I saying unknowing or, in this case, being agnostic is better than believing? No, because I’m choosing to not prescribe to being agnostic, instead I’m here to explore “agnostia,” the highest form of faith.
Jesus touched and healed anyone who desired it. There were no other requisites.
When here (on earth), the dude was so present, so helpful, living by example asking us to heal, love and bless everyone, including our enemies. So, while he was here, there were no conditions, so why after his passing do people need to go to heaven or hell based on their performance in this play called life? What happened? Did he get all conditional after his resurrection?
You want answers, right? I don’t have them, but I have faith that what Jesus showed us is that kindness is your key to immortality, alive or dead.
Life moves first towards diversity, and then toward union of that diversity at ever higher levels — Richard Rohr — Author of Falling Upward.
“Diversity” in this era of “inclusion,” “wokeness,” and “social justice,” is a frontrunner word in cultural discourse, so knowing what I know (which is not much, if anything at all (coming from the thought school of Socrates)), we must embrace diversity, because we all become closer together if we do. If you’re thinking, I must be on some wild psychedelic drug for believing that we as a species, if we are to learn and accept each other, and not feel uncomfortable with each other, we must be open to communicate with each other, then I bring the example of the ultimate cool one himself, Jesus into the debate.
Jesus used to hang with a diverse crowd, and always committed to giving his best to everyone. Jesus frequently engaged with women, which was unusual for the time, but there’s two women that, if you were to believe the biblical stories, and rumours, Jesus was one cool hombre’.
Mary Magdalene is a figure mentioned in the New Testament of the Bible. She is depicted as one of the followers of Jesus Christ and plays a significant role in the events surrounding his crucifixion. According to the Gospels, she was present at the crucifixion, standing near the cross along with a few other women. It took a while, but centuries later, according to some traditions associated her with being a repentant sinner or a prostitute, but through my research, these ideas have no basis in the biblical accounts, but I love the thought of Jesus hanging with the ladies of the night. There’s something so innocent and acceptant about that.
I thought I’d mention here that there are no writings about Jesus before he was 30, so it leaves a gaping hole in how, from a baby, he navigated through life. I’m super curious about the fact that he was a carpenter; So, who taught him the skillset? Who was his teacher, mentor, boss? I’m trying to imagine him going around people’s houses and giving quotes for jobs. How much would he charge? Would he get caught up in the bartering? Would he get good referrals? I digress.
The next lady he used to hang with was Martha of Bethany, she was commonly known as the sister of Mary and Lazarus. This is important information because there was a significant episode involving Martha in the Gospel of John (John 11:1–44). Lazarus falls ill and dies. Jesus arrives in Bethany (where Martha lived) four days after Lazarus’ death, and the story would have it that Martha expresses her faith in Jesus, stating (did she state, or was she being a little irrational in wanting to share the blame?) that if he had been present earlier, her brother would not have died. So, my man does what any man who wants to impress a woman does, he proceeds to raise Lazarus from the dead. My dude!
What about the wine story? There’s a famous painting, now residing in the Louvre, of “the wedding at cava,” painted by Paolo Veronese in 1563. In the painting, which looks like a proper drunk fest, at the front on the right (your right), you can see servants pouring wine from big stone water jars into golden amphoras (stone containers). Look up in the middle of the painting and you will see the most famous being in recorded human history, Jesus of Nazareth, sitting there with a glowing beam around his head. Next to him is his mum, Mary. Story would have it that the wine for the night had run out, and Jesus was in low key mode. He didn’t want any attention, one because it looked like a rowdy bunch that were doing a bit more than drinking, and the other reason was that he did not want to go to this wedding party, but his mum insisted. If you think about it, Jesus was around 30 at this point and his mum always faced ridicule because she always professed he was the son of God, so she always wanted to be seen with him, and should the occasion have it, Jesus can show his divine powers. This was the opportunity. With a simple order from Mary to the waiters to simply follow her son’s lead, Jesus spotted 6 big water jars in the room’s corner and he asked the servers to fill them up to the brim with water. They did just that. As the servers were filling them up, Jesus motioned to the jars and performed what I heard to be an “epiphany miracle” and the party continued with the wine flowing.
We know little about Jesus. The information we have is from other people’s stories, and after he was 30. He wrote nothing down, but that hasn’t stopped us being continually mystically curious about the Son of God, and if we are to lean towards George Gurdjieff thoughts of personality and essence, then it’s clear we know little about Jesus’s personality, apart from the fact he was disproportionately kind, but we (certainly I do) get the impression, he was the epitome of essence, and faith is the cool.
That’s why Jesus is so cool, because we all have faith, which means we all have Jesus within.
