Easter, Ressurection and Eternal Life

In the Contemplative Tradition

By Rev. Gerald H. Slusser, Ph.D.

Easter in our modern culture is celebrated with brightly colored eggs, bunny rabbits and egg hunts as much as with worship, much less with understanding. Some Christian leaders have rejected the very name Easter because of its connection with ancient non-Christian religions; one might be tempted to say the same in our contemporary culture. How is it possible to keep alive the promise and, still more, the understanding of the Easter symbols when we are surrounded, indeed immersed in the physical, visual and verbal manifestations of a materialistic culture with its implied metaphysic? We do not understand that we have incorporated this materialistic metaphysic because it is proclaimed as simple, obvious truth. Jung referred to this problem of the West as a "new disease".

"The critical philosophy of science became as it were negatively metaphysical—in other words materialistic—on the basis of an error in judgment; matter was assumed to be a tangible and recognizable reality. Yet this is a thoroughly metaphysical concept hypostatized by uncritical minds. Matter is an hypothesis. When you say matter, you are really creating a symbol for something unknown, which may just as well be ‘spirit’ or anything else. . ."

The contemplative tradition’s view of the meaning of the Easter events is quite profound and will help us better to understand sacrifice, resurrection and eternal life. If we are to grasp the contemplative view in any depth, it is necessary first to grasp the central ideas and symbols of that tradition. We may well begin with the understanding of God that prevailed in this tradition until modern time, until the period mistakenly called the Enlightenment (It would be better called the "endarkenment", if one dared so to speak). The older tradition as with Meister Eckhart, did not understand God as "totally other" or as "outside" this world. Instead God is in all and all is in God. "God created all things in such a way that they are not outside himself, as ignorant people falsely imagine. Everything that God creates or does he does or creates in himself, sees or knows in himself, loves in himself." It is basically wrong in Eckhart’s sight to think of God as a person "out there".

For those of us who were nurtured in the Christian tradition these words emphasizing the immanence and inner presence of God seem strange, even wrong. We learned to think of God as "up there", "out there". Even the Lord’s prayer says "Our Father who art in heaven" and certainly heaven is not here and now. But again, we need to listen to Eckhart carefully, for he is enunciating the authentic New Testament of Jesus’ teachings. "God is in all things. The more he is in things, the more he is outside of things. The more he is within, all the more he is without." Eckhart compares this situation to that of one speaking a word; it goes out, but it remains within also. He restates, yes God is within everything, "but to the extent that god is godly and to the extent that he is intelligible, God is nowhere as much as he is in the soul . . . in the innermost dimensions of the soul and in the highest aspect of the soul. And when I say ‘the innermost’, I mean the highest . . . these two are one." This last is a very important note, especially since, partially because of the influence of psychology, we tend to think of I "inner" as relating to the ego and Freud’s subconscious.

In order better to understand Eckhart at this point it is helpful to use some of the insights of C.G. Jung regarding the nature of ego and the highest center of the psyche, which he termed the Self, note the capital "S". Jung found that the ego is not the center of the psyche, although for most people it is experienced as the center and the only center. But Jung’s studies of human nature led him to realize that there is a transcendent center to the psyche. Further, he concluded that the psyche is far vaster than had been previously thought. Jung discerned what we may term three aspects to psyche: consciousness, the personal-unconscious and beyond that what Jung simply termed the unconscious (or, collective-unconscious, or transpersonal psyche). These last two terms need some expansion.

The personal unconscious, as Jung descried, is built up during one’s lifetime. It contains all those "memory traces", one might say, that are the remnants of each and every experience, a vast storehouse. But that storehouse is not readily available to consciousness. Some of it can be recalled with a bit of effort, but more is there which has been "repressed", portions which ego-consciousness does not wish to know. Much therapy is concerned with the content and effects and affects of this latter portion.

Beyond the personal unconscious and not at all available to consciousness is the unconscious proper, the transpersonal psyche, or collective-unconscious.. Jung said he called this aspect "unconscious" meaning simply that it was not available to consciousness. Further, it was Jung’s conviction that this aspect of psyche manifested itself in all kinds of ways in tendencies, likes, dislikes, and in dreams. He compared the psyche to a vast ocean with the ego-conscious aspect like the visible part of an iceberg, the personal-unconscious like the underwater portion of the iceberg and the ocean itself as the unconscious proper, the transpersonal psyche.

As his studies continued, Jung realized that there is a similarity, a pattern in people’s dreams and other unconscious products. Often this pattern resembles an ancient myth, even though the person apparently had no contact whatever with that myth. Jung’s conclusion from this resulted in his archetypal theory. The easiest way to understand the archetypal theory is to connect it with Plato’s theory of "ideas". This theory was that every particular thing is an example of a general principle, the latter being in the mind of God. We give a name to a thing, e.g., a certain animal is called a horse, another a lion. The words horse and lion are used of all the exemplars of that name. Thus Plato, or probably Socrates before him, theorized, there is an eternal, a Divine idea, which is the Ultimate Type for every particular thing. This Ultimate Type came to be called an archetype; the Greek word arche meaning source or origin, and typos meaning that which shapes or molds. This line of thought was continued and elaborated down through the centuries following Plato and is found, of course somewhat modified, in Jung and in the great modern metaphysicians such as A.N. Whitehead, Frithjof Schuon, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Rene Guenon and Mircea Eliade. The last four all were acquainted with Jung’s theory, but for one reason or another choose to use his insights, but give him little or no credit, even denounce his work.

It is the archetypes that give patterns to all life forms. Each person shares in this universal Source. But the Source, the archetypal foundation, the makeup of the collective-unconscious, is differentially patterned in each person. Just as we all have fingerprints and each person’s fingerprints are unique, so each has different dynamic of archetypal activity. It seems helpful to think of archetypes in some measure like the currents in the ocean; they are there and even so stable that we can name them and depend on them, but they do vary from time to time in their power and path.

A further important factor of Jung’s thought is his realization that psyche is illimitable, having no boundaries that we can set or determine. For Jung the inward domain was far more important than the outward. He realized that the modern world’s denial of important to the inward was a result of its materialistic metaphysic, which, as noted above, is not credible. Equally important is his realization that ego-consciousness is not the center of psyche, only of the conscious portion and that ego is not the master of psyche at all. Jung said the fact is that psyche has you, not that you have a psyche. When he said the psyche has you, it is meant in a double sense; first that ego is subject to psyche, but secondly that ego is the child of psyche.

There is a center of psyche however, which Jung termed the Self. (I prefer to call this center the Divine Center.) Jung observed that He could not on the basis of any data separate the Self from God. This Divine Center is quite akin to the concept in Indian thought of the Atman, or God-center. One may rightfully connect this line of thought with the Biblical imago dei. The Self is the God Archetype and, as such, is over all and in all aspects of psyche. Jung was fond of the medieval statement that God is a circle whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere. Thus, Jung was in precise agreement with Eckhart’s statement "God is in all things. The more he is in things, the more he is outside of things. The more he is within, all the more he is without." Hence, our true Divine Center is the center of psyche, as of all things. It is important to know that Jung was not alone in this line of thought because the notion of the human as including, as it were, two centers that stand in tension (so far as the lesser is concerned) is akin to the dual nature of Christ and is the foundation of the "Atman Project" as described by Wilber. As further evidence of this dual nature I will cite Rene Guenon who is widely acknowledge as among the greatest scholars of religion and metaphysics of modern time.

Reference must be made here . . .to the fundamental distinction between the "Self" and the "ego", or between the "personality" and the "individuality" . . .The "Self". . .is the transcendent and permanent principle of which the manifested being, the human being for example, is no more than a transient and contingent modification, which moreover can in no wise affect this principle. . . The Self is thus the principle by which all the states of the being exist . . .

Now again let us consider the role of ego-consciousness in psyche. In one of his greatest works, Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self, Jung paraphrases Ignatius on this matter: "Man’s consciousness was created to the end that it may (1) recognize its descent from a higher unity (Deum); (2) pay due and careful regard to this source (reverentium exhibeat); (3) execute its commands intelligently and responsibly (serviat); and (4) thereby afford the psyche as a whole the optimum degree of life and development (salvet animam suam). We should further note the description of this volume on its dust cover: "The central theme of this volume is the symbolical representation of the psychic totality through the concept of the Self, whose traditional historical equivalent is the figure of Christ." (Here, I would add, that the traditional equivalent is Christ in Western civilization, but not in the East in which case one would have to say Buddha, or Krishna.) Thus ego-consciousness is by no means an end in itself, nor is it the dominant power of psyche. The purpose and role of ego in psyche is that of the servant, not the master. But, as with the tenants in the parable of the vineyard of Matt. 21:33ff, the ego calls the psyche its own and attempts to wrest control from the proper Master, i.e. resists the call to a higher destiny than ego pleasure/aggrandizement.

If we are to understand the Easter events in their symbolic power, we will need to keep this picture of ego and Self in mind. "What is always necessary to liberation is to understand and be fully aware of what one is doing. – For, as Meister Eckhart has said, ‘He who would be what he ought to be must stop being what he is.’" So what is it that we are? And what has that to do with the Easter events? Kierkegaard asked this question in another way; how is it that the grace released through the Easter Event trickles down to me?

A block to understanding Easter is what is often considered to be the traditional doctrine, viz. "We are redeemed by Christ’s sacrifice". There are, of course, several variations on this theory about atonement (at-one-ment, uniting). The worst seem to regard the crucifixion as some sort of payment to the devil by God to avoid humans having to pay for their own sins, or as a bribe to God so that our sin can be overlooked. These are the substitutionary and ransom theories of atonement. Another serious misconclusion is that since Christ has paid the penalty, we don’t have to pay. Each of these, and some others, assume that the Easter Event is in some way to change God, or God’s intention/attitude toward humans. This assumes that God is the alienated one, whereas, in fact, it is humans who are alienated. "God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to himself . . . "; the reconciling activity is directed toward the world, not toward God. "For God so loved the world . . ." This line of thought also neglects the fact that to be cut off from God means not to exist at all!

Nonetheless, there was sacrifice, and as we recognize each time we repeat the liturgy of communion/mass there is some kind of continuing sacrifice. What can this symbolism mean? Who is sacrificed and how? It seems to be we who carry out the sacrifice each time; we are the sacrificers. Who or what then is sacrificed? I suppose traditionally we might say, or think that Christ is sacrificed; one for all and once for all as some verses in the NT seem to teach. It is clear however, throughout all the later prophets and in the NT that God is not pleased by the sacrifice of animals or others on our behalf. What is required, what alone is adequate is ourselves. We are to be both the sacrificer and the sacrifice.

Thus now we ask not what is enacted outwardly, but what is accomplished inwardly by the sacrificer who knows the meaning of this act. It is important to be accurate here, lest we make the mistake of so many ascetics and think that it is the body that is to be sacrificed. As St. Paul observed "If I give away all that I have and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing." (I Cor. 13:3). The one who merely offers up the body does not understand the meaning of "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (John 3:6).

It is necessary to return to the discussion above of the nature of the human if we are to grasp what sacrifice is about. The human being, under the conditions of time and space, i.e., during life, is a duality of ego and Self. The ego is exemplified by our willfulness, our will to ego gratification or ego aggrandizement. Ego is what we usually think we are, i.e. what we mean when we use the pronoun "I" and that includes especially our recollection of the past of that "I" with its sense of triumph and tragedy, joy and despair. Yet, as has been indicated above, the center of the total person, of the psyche, is not the ego, but the Self, or in my terms the Divine Center, which is a unity with God. In fact the Self is the center and circumference of the total person.

What is always necessary to liberation is to understand and be fully aware of what one is doing. So we must realize that the inner meaning of all sacrifice has to be the willing giving up of our ego gratification. In other words, the appetitive soul, the greedy mind, is the Sacrifice. We, as we are in ourselves, seeking ends of our own, are the appropriate burnt-offering . . . We see why it is always assumed that the Sacrifice, even of an animal, is a voluntary one; there could be no inner meaning of an unwilling victim.

To try to project this necessary sacrifice onto the body, much less some lesser thing such as our possessions, is not merely not of any gain, but is living in delusion. Further, this kind of sacrifice leads to pride, ego aggrandizement. This fact does not mean that even the cup of cold water given to the needy is useless, but that it is only valid if given as an act of love with no expectation of return. The gift of our possessions becomes increasingly trivial, i.e. of less ego importance, as we progress in having given our ego over to the service of Self. But to repeat Eckhart’s insights, this must be done knowingly, with self-knowledge.

Before turning to the symbols of Easter and how they teach the need for meaning of ego sacrifice, a little background on ego development and what that means for spirituality is needed. The human is made for God and for that end alone. Eckhart wrote "Know that, by nature every creature seeks to become like God". Johann Tauler said "All creatures seek after unity; all multiplicity struggles toward it—the universal aim of all life is always this unity." A modern psychotherapist, Fritz Kunkel, said "Being one with the universe, one with God—that is what we wish for most, whether we know it or not." Or as Gerald May summarizes: "There is a desire within each of us, in the deep center of our-selves that we call our heart. We were born with it, it is never completely satisfied, and it never dies. . . It is the human desire for love. . . Our true identity, our reason for being, is to be found in this desire." And finally, Dag Hammarsjold wrote, "I don’t know Who—or what—put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone—or Something—and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, had a goal." Each of these quotes points to a fact about human existence, in fact to all existence; it is goal directed from the beginning by an interior reality and that goal is God. It is this internal directedness characterizing all existence that gives life meaning, purpose, and direction. But, if that be the case, why is the path so difficult, why do so few seem to be staying on the narrow way? "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life and those who find it are few." (Matt. 7:13-14)

Each person’s history begins with the pre-natal period in which the infant lives in identity with the mother. This state of fusion continues in the neonate and continues for some months. Gradually, the ego appears; its evidence being the expression of a personal will, often by saying NO!, or making some other demand. In the state of fusion, one is in some respects like Adam and Eve in the garden, a state that Paul Tillich termed "dreaming innocence". This state is one of unconscious oneness with all and with The All, i.e., with God. But, as Ken Wilber has made remarkably clear, in some psychological thought there is confusion between this pre-conscious state and the spiritual goal of unity consciousness. The pre-conscious state is not equivalent to the goal of the spiritual life. Wilber terms this confusion the "pre-trans fallacy". The infant is not immersed in actual God-consciousness, which is then repressed (thereby lost) during the first or second year of life. The infant is not in a state of perfect wholeness at all, but is unconscious of its oneness with God. As he puts it, "You can’t get any lower! The loss has already occurred."

Gradually, then, in the process of ego development one becomes conscious and that consciousness is characterized especially by two factors: one, that life as it is, is not enough; it is incomplete. This first factor is the manifestation of that central character of the human described above as the need for God, the inherent quest for God. This is Augustine’s "our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee". The sense of incompleteness, leads to the second factor characterizing consciousness: the search to be complete, the quest for that which though unknown is felt to be missing. Wilber has called this eternal quest the Atman Project, the goal of which is ultimate Unity Consciousness in/with God. Unfortunately, even tragically so to speak, the Atman Project is carried out in two ways. The first, a destructive path, the path of ego aggrandizement, mistakes the ego for the Divine Center and turns all life to that service. The second way is the way of the spiritual life, the contemplative life. The first way is doomed to continual frustration and sense of incompleteness because the ego cannot be the Divine Center whose place it is trying to usurp.

Now to turn to the symbols of Easter proper: The meaning of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion-resurrection is seen when it is viewed as exemplar of the climax of the spiritual path that we all must follow to be united with God thereby reassuming our true identity. Thus crucifixion is a model, an analogy, a symbol, a lesson, a pattern to be followed. The cross when so understood can be seen as Christ’s destiny, his unique life pattern to be fulfilled. Then to take up one’s cross, to follow after Jesus, does not mean in any literal sense to imitate the life of Jesus, but rather to see His life as a symbol, a paradigm to be understood, applied, in the light of one’s own particular life circumstance. C.G. Jung seeing this clearly wrote:

We Protestants must sooner or later face this question: Are we to understand the "imitation of Christ" in the sense that we should copy his life and, if I may use the expression, "ape" his stigmata, or in the deeper sense that we are to live our own proper lives as truly as he lived his in its individual uniqueness? It is no easy matter to live a life that is modeled on Christ’s, but it is unspeakable harder to live one’s own life, as truly as Christ lived his.

In the following, it is to be understood that this is not an historical interpretation, but a metaphorical and metaphysical one, i.e., a consideration of the meaning attached to these symbols in their inner meaning for the psyche. I do not intend to imply any doubt of the history associated with these symbols, but to recognize a deeper and more profound meaning, an archetypal meaning. I will emphasize this approach with a quote from Rene Guenon: "In this connection we will repeat once again that we have not the slightest intention of disputing the ‘historicity’ of certain particular events. On the contrary, we view the historical events as themselves symbols of a reality of a higher order, and on this basis alone do they possess any significance for us." The major symbols of Easter are the Mount on which the crucifixion took place, the Cross itself, the Suffering and Death, and the Resurrection/Ascension. The significance with which we are concerned is not what is done outwardly, but what is accomplished inwardly by the understanding sacrificer.

The mountain is a traditional symbol in Biblical material. It is the place of God’s manifestation, the deliverance of God’s ordinances, the meeting place of God and person. The mountain means ascent, particularly the mystical, spiritual ascent to the place where spirit is present. The place of crucifixion was Golgotha, meaning "skull" which in Latin is calvaria and in English is translated calvary. This name was given the place because in the common understanding the promontory was shaped like a skull. To Christians Golgotha became the center of the world; it was both the topmost point of the cosmic mountain and the spot where Adam was created and buried. The blood of Jesus was thus shed over Adam’s skull at the very foot of the cross thereby redeeming and transforming the old Adam. But there is more, because this is not only the mount of Jesus crucifixion for the knowing sacrificer. As Coomaraswamy points out in his study of sacrifice, in the traditional context of mythic expression, mountain means both seat and grave. In English "barrow" is both hill and burial mound and is related to "borough" as in bury. Thus mountain is the place in which God is "buried". "We are then the ‘mountain’ in which God is ‘buried’, just as a church or a stupa, and the world itself, are His tomb and the ‘cave’ into which He descends for our awakening." That God is buried within us underlies the widespread symbols of digging for buried treasure and that of mining. It is further the reason that the spiritual quest is general regarded as an inward quest. Recall here the relation of Self to ego.

In the early Christian tradition the crucifixion took place on a mountain on a rude tree. The tree early on was identified as the center of the world and with the central tree of the Garden of Eden. The Mishna teaches that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil of Genesis was a vine. Jesus had spoken of himself as the vine and his disciples as the branches. Among the planting cultures, that universally preceded the hunting cultures, the vine was the symbol of immortality, just as wine was the symbol of youth and everlasting life. Grapes and wine symbolized wisdom till quite late in O.T. tradition. This close association of symbols have a clear and powerful meaning: here on this mount, with this tree, we have a "center of the world", (axis mundi), a source of life, youth, and immortality. The trees signify the universe in endless regeneration, but at the heart of the universe is always a tree, the tree of eternal life or knowledge. In Christian legend and symbolism the cross is often depicted as the tree of life, able to bring the dead to life, and as being made from the wood of the tree of life of the Garden of Eden.

The tree as a cross has further symbolic and thus metaphysical meaning. The tree of crucifixion has been transformed in Christian legend, in accord with the symbolism of world religion in general, into a tree of life. This tree is the center of the world, the source of life and is located on the holy mountain. The cross has two arms, the horizontal and the vertical indicating the two aspects of human life. The horizontal is human life in the dimensions of time and space, in this world. The vertical is the spiritual dimension of life; it is God’s penetrating presence within each of us so that our call to unity with God is inescapable (though not irresistible). God works within us not by force, but by the tender element of love and the suggestion of a present kingdom of heaven. This tree/cross "embodies absolute reality, the course of life and sacred power. Whether it be a Cosmic Tree, a Tree of Everlasting Life or a Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, the road leading to it is a ‘hard path’, sown with obstacles: the tree is in inaccessible places, guarded by monsters. Not everyone who tries reaches it, nor, once arrived manages to win the duel he must fight with the monster mounting guard. . . . the thing that symbolizes absolute reality, sacred power and immortality, is hard of access. [Attainment] requires an initiation, a ‘heroic’ or ‘mystical’ conquest of immortality."

Why is this end so hard to attain? Again the cross with its two arms symbolizes the duality that plagues human life, our dual nature discussed previously. Ego-consciousness claims to be the center, and proceeds to build life on this basis. However, since it is not the true center, such a life endeavor must inevitably fail and will experience this failure to be supreme from earliest childhood. The spiritual journey is universally viewed as a journey, i.e., a growth or development process that passes through many steps or stages, although these may not be discrete, or even exactly sequential. Nonetheless, each step must at some time be accomplished. The ego must finally give way to the Divine Center and do so willingly as a "self-sacrifice". Again, it appears that this is not a one-time event, but one that must be repeated over and over at succeedingly higher levels of spiritual development. In these regards the cross/ crucifixion symbolize the suffering and death of the ego necessary to realize unity with the Divine.

It is this unity with the Divine that is symbolized in the Resurrection-Ascension. To use some terms which are coming into contemporary integral thought, the passage through life from its beginning in preconsciousness to its final possibility in Divine Unity spans the spectrum of consciousness. In Christian terms we speak of the different modes of consciousness as if they were specific realities: matter, body, mind, soul, spirit, but we usually don’t think of these as modes of consciousness. Considering these as modes of consciousness as does Wilber gives the following: Matter is the dimension with the least, or even no, consciousness. This is the physical universe as it appears in our own bodies. Body in this context means the emotional body with its "animal" drives of sex, hunger, need for shelter etc., i.e., the biological essentials. Mind is the aspect studied by psychology, viz., the rational, reasoning, linguistic and imaginative mind. Soul is the higher mind, sometimes called the subtle mind, the archetypal mind, the intuitive mind and essence, or indestructible aspect of our being (usually studied by theology). Spirit is the transcendent summit of our being, our ultimate possibility of Unity Consciousness and is studied by contemplative mysticism.

What can be said of eternal life? First and quite importantly, eternal life is not some mere extension of the present consciousness. Or, as the great English preacher P.T. Forsyth observed, when most people speak of eternal life what they mean is another round of this life, only better oiled. I have above referred to unity consciousness as the goal of the contemplative life, indeed as the goal of all serious Christian practice. Now it may be said that unity consciousness is the ultimate state of consciousness variously called eternal life, Nirvana, Satori, Deliverance, Unity with God. Insofar as this state is realized in life, it means the transcendence of ego. Transcendence does not mean extinction, or dissolution, but that the aspirations of the ego no longer have precedence. Taking sacrifice and eternal life to mean the death of ego is akin to that all too common fallacy of neglecting or denying Jesus very human life. Frithjof Schuon refers to the Sufi saying that "Paradise is inhabited by fools" as referring to those who are attached to phenomena rather than to the one and only Subject, which is its own Object and Beatitude. The Paradise of fools is that for which the ordinary, or outward, ego seeks and which, at least in imagination, can be found in this world and its goods; it is nourished on phenomena and thus is dualistic. The "I", the inward ego, that has transcended ordinary ego, looks towards its own transcendent and immanent source. In this state, we might say, one has become what one has always already been, but of which fact one was quite unaware. It is difficult for western Christians to accept the fact that our true identity is God-identity, the "Thou art That" of Hindu thought. Ultimate reality is not something that at last we see, but rather the ever-present Seer, the I of Spirit. Things that are seen come and go; they arise and pass away, but the Witness, the Seer of these things does not come and go. The Seer is not an object, not something we see, but the ever-present Witness of all. You are and always have been this consciousness, but the mistaking of ego-consciousness for the center of our being keeps us from knowing our True Identity. Things that are seen come and go, but the Seer, True Consciousness is none of these things and does not come and go. So, as Wilber says, "the ultimate state of consciousness –intrinsic Spirit itself—is not hard to reach but impossible to avoid." When we finally let go of all our attachments to ordinary ego-consciousness, the end of our exploring is at hand, as T.S. Eliot said:

Easter, Ressurection and Eternal Life

In the Contemplative Tradition

And the end of our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.