THE NEW AGE JESUS

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW
INTERNATIONAL VERSION.

Amid all the fuss about the 1988 film The Last Temptation of Christ many viewers failed to notice that
the Jesus of the film espoused New Age theol-ogy. We hear Jesus pantheistically proclaiming that
"everything's part of God." Picking up some dirt and stones, Jesus says, "This too is my body" and so
deifies the cosmos. Not surprisingly, several New Age thinkers picked up on this and hailed the movie
as a challenge to the church to radically rethink its image of Jesus.
The New Age movement finds in Jesus a kin-dred spirit. Rather than exiling Jesus to the legen-dary
lore of religious imagination or debunking him as a messianic pretender, New Age writers see Jesus as
an enlightened master who manifested a divine power-a power potentially available to all who enter the
New Age.
The New Age movement is an eclectic configuiration of spiritual seekers who have despaired of
finding personal and cosmic satisfaction in either religious orthodoxies or secular materialism. In-stead,
they have turned to unconventional and eso-teric sources in the hopes of finding what they seek in the
ambiance of the mystical, magical and meta-physical.' Given these tendencies, the Jesus of or-thodox
Christianity may seem inadequate. Jesus, it is claimed, must be rescued from a pedestrian and parochial
orthodoxy that dernands he monopolize the deity. The issue of contention between historic Chris-
tianity and the New Age is not whether Jesus is God in human form. New Age teachings affirm this.
The issue is whether Jesus is uniquely and supremely God incarnate, or whether we are all God in
human form.

Jesus in the New Age

Because of its diversity, the New Age movement has no single view of Jesus, hut it offers a family of
related views whose common factors lend them selves to a basic summary.
1. The New Age highly esteems Jesus as a spiri-tually attuned or evolved being who serves as an
example for spiritual discovery and evolutionary advancement. Jesus is referred to by various positive
terms and titles including Master, Guru, Yogi, Adept, Avatar, Shaman and Way shower. He is revered
along with other religious leaders such as Buddha, Krishna and Lao Tze.
2. Many argue for the separation of Jesus the individual person of history from the universal and
impersonal Christ Consciousness, or Christ Principle. His consciousness of God and miracles were
evidence he tapped into a higher level ofconscious-ness. But if Jesus tapped into this cosmic power, he
did not monopolize it. So New Age philosopher David Spangler, echoing the ancient Unostics, said in
his Reflections on the Christ that, "The Christ is not the pmvince of a single individual."2 As Joseph
Campbell put it in the best-selling hook The Power of Myth (1988), "We are all manifestations of
Buddha consciousness or Christ consciousness, only we don't know it."3Christhood comes through
self-discovery; we may all become Christs if we tap into the universal energy, the Christ consciousness.
3. The onhodox Christian affirmation that Jesus is the supreme and final revelation of God is ques-
tioned. Although Jesus is respected, he is not wor-shiped. Janet Bock, author of The Jesus Mystery,
complains that "the position that Jesus was the only 'Son of God' ... is, in effect, a limiting of the power
of God, a shackling of divinity to one physical form for all ~
4. Jesus' crucifixion, if accepted as historical, is not deemed essential to restore the spiritual
whole-ness of humanity. Jesus' suffering on the cross is either rejected as unhistorical or reinterpreted
to exclude the idea that he suffered as the Christ to pay the penalty for human wrongdoing in order to
rec-oncile people to a holy God. Elizabeth Clare Prophet, leader of The Church Universal andTrium-
phant, states emphatically that the idea of a blood sacrifice is "an erroneous doctrine," actually "a rem-
nant of pagan rite long refuted by the word of God" and never taughtby Jesus himselt 5 Since the New
Age woild view denies both human sinfulness and a per-sonal God who is ethically perfect, Jesus'
crucifixion loses its traditional significance.
5. Belief in Jesus' resurrection and ascension is
denied or spiritualized to remove them from the realm of the physical and the historical. Many others
besides Jesus are recognized as "Ascended Mas-ters" on the spiritual plane. In The Power of Myth,
Campbell interprets the Ascension to mean that Jesus "has gone inward... to the place from which all
being comes, into the consciousness that is the source of all things, the kingdom of heaven within."6
For Campbell, Jesus does not ascend to the right hand of the Father but descends to the divine depths of
the collective soul.
6. The idea of Jesus' Second Coming is spiritu-alized and democratized to refer to the evolutionary
ascent of an awakened humanity. Soli, billed as an "off planet being" channeled through Neville Rowe,
offers this esoteric insight: "You are God. You are, each and every one, part of the Second Coming."7
The notion that "this same Jesus" (Acts 1:11) who literally and bodily ascended to heaven will himself
return in like manner on Judgment Day is rejected as narrow-minded literalism. Furthermore, final
judgment after death is denied in favor of reincar-nation.
7. New Age thinkers accept extra-biblical documents as sources for authentic information about
Jesus. Although the Bible is often cited, its function is secondary to other texts. Instead, the spiritually
inquisitive often turn to alternative records of Jesus' life. This quest for a "lost Christianity" follows
several routes which converge at key points.
Many believe that Gnostic texts discovered at Nag Hammadi, Egypt, provide a trustworthy record of
Jesus as a spiritual catalyst who came to awaken the spark of divinity locked in our bodily prison. Self-
knowledge, or gnosis, is the means of salva-tion. Since they hear titles such as The Gospel of Thomas
or The Gospel of Peter, many assume the Gnostic materials are historically trustworthy documents that
were expelled from orthodoxy by defensive clerics.
Another strand of revisionism harks back to a book called The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ,
published in 1894 by a Russian journalist, Nicholas Notovitch. This book claims to unveil an ancient
Tibetan record of Jesus' 'lost years" (between ages 13 and 29), which he spent studying, teaching and
traveling in rhe mystic East. This Jesus, called "Saint Issa," bears little resemblance to the central figure
of the Gospels but serves to synthesize Judaism, Christianity and Eastern religions in a narrative
setting.
Others find the key to Jesus in the ancient Essene community at Qumran, near the Dead Sea.
C]aiming to base their interpretation on the Dead Sea Scrolls or other material, they see Jesus as part of
a mystical remnant preserved from the fundamentalism of his day. Shirley MacLaine puts forth this
thesis in her book Going Within by saying that "Jesus and the Essenes, with their teachings on love and
light and cosmic laws along with the Golden Rule of karma, sound very much like metaphysical
seekers in the New Age today."8
These esoteric materials are often augmented or eclipsed by revelations thought to originate beyond
history entirely. Channelers or mediums receive messages about Jesus from personal spirit beings such
as Ramtha (through i. Z. Knight). Others, such as Edgar Cayce and Rudolf Steiner, keyed into an
impersonal plane of higher consciousness called the Akashic Records or the Collective Unconscious, to
extract a picture of Jesus not in harmony with that of the New Testament. The popular three-volume set
A Course in Miracles claims to have been dic-tated by Jesus himself. Yet it denies historic Chris-tian
teachings such as original sin, the sacrificial death of Christ, reconc~iation with God by faith in Jesus,
and a literal heaven and hell.
8. When the Bible is cited with reference to Jesus. an appeal is made to an esoteric dimension lost on
those holding traditional interpretations. The Bible must he decoded to discern its secret substra-turn.
So, when Jesus said that John the Baptist was Elijah, he was saying that John was the reincarnation of
Elijah, not that John simply came with the same '~spin.t and power of Elijah" without being literally
Elijah (Luke 1:17). When he said, "the kingdom of heaven is within you," he really meant the soul is
divine, not that the kingdom was breaking into history through Jesus (Luke 17:20-37).
In the New Age, Jesus is understood apart from biblical moorings and placed in an alien intellectual
and spiritual atmosphere. Jesus, the Christ conscious Master, is hailed as our prototype for spiritual
discovery and power. He is a Christ without a cross or physical resurrection, preaching a gospel
without repentance or forgiveness, before an audience of
potential equals who have no sin and are in no peril of perdition. Is this the genuine Jesus, obscured by
the church and orthodoxy?

Is the New Testament Reliable?

Before considering the claims and credentials of the biblical Jesus, we should outline a response to crit-
icisms that the biblical sources themselves arc not historically reliable, or are at least inferior to New
Age documents about Jesus.
The New Testament is often undervalued be-cause of its antiquity and its manner of compilation. First,
it is deemed unreliable because of the number of translations and editions. Often people will reject its
authority by saying, "Well, it has been translated so many times These kinds of criticisms can be met
by emphasizing that, in terms of the number and quality of ancient manuscripts, the New Testa-ment is
the best- attested collection of literature from antiquity. Some 5,366 partial or complete Greek
manuscripts of the New Testament have been recovered, dating as far back as the end of the first
century. The large number of manuscripts give scholars a rich resource for reconstructing the origiwere
not rejected for merely political motives."
In light of this evidence, the burden of proof lies on any other purported record of the life of Jesus that
contradicts the New Testament. Can the New Age revisionist documents hear historical scrutiny?

Testing New Age Documents

The New Testament, a collection of first century documents, is far better attested than Gnostic texts.
The Gnostic texts are second or third century documents which editorially alter an already existing
orthodox view of Jesus. None of the Nag flammadi texts, for instance, is an actual gospel of the form of
the canonical Gospels. Rather, they are largely metaphysical discourses which for the most part hear
little resemblance to the New Testament either stylistically or theologically. The Nag Hammadi texts,
for instance, refer to material found in the biblical Gospels and sometimes even recognize their
antecedent authority; yet they convey a perspective more akin to a later editorial revision than to a
credible report from independent and reliable sources."
The Notovitch material (claiming to reveal "the lost years of Jesus" spent in India, Persia and else
where) was roundly condemned as unreliable by such noted orientalists as F. Max Muller and others
shortly after its publication. The story of Jesus' supposed travels eastward contains several historical
falsehoods (known to be such from extra-biblical history).
It bears no resemblance to any one religion of the time during which it was supposedly written, thus
betraying its fictional nature. Despite continued interest in The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ, the
supposed Tibetan original manuscript has were ever been available for scholarly study; there exists no
adequate verification of its existence, let alone its credibility. Many scholars have flatly rejected it as a
fraud. perhaps it's better to have 5,366 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament in the
hand than (at most) one exotic manuscript lost in the Tibetan bush."Claims that Jesus was a New Ager
by virtue of being an Essene mystic are historically questionable
on at least two grounds. First, the Essenes of the Dead Sea Scrolls were not proto-New Agers who
taught pantheism and reincarnation. Rather, they were militantly monotheistic Jews who, despite
sectarian idiosyncrasies, affirmed human sinfulness, an
eternal hell and a predestinating, personal God. This is hardly New Age theology. Second, despite
some similarity between Jesus' teachings and the Essenes (due largely to their common reverence for
the Old Testament), there is a deep rift between them concerning asceticism, ethics, salvation and other
issues. The Essenes were not New Agers, and Jesus was no Essene.
With regard to channeled material, we should question why credence should be given to a revelation
with no historical verification over documents with considerable historical verification specially when
channeled sources deny the central tenets of what Christians have affirmed for two thousand years.
Edgar Cayce testified to the contradiction he-tween the biblical message about Jesus and what he
himself delivered during his trances. Cayce, who had taught Sunday school for years before giving his
trance "readings," said the following shortly after discovering what he had been relating during his
unconscious trances: "What the readings have been saying, is foreign to all I've believed and taught,
and all I have taught others, all my life. If ever the Devil was going to play a trick on me, this
wouldbeit."'7
Because of this kind of danger, the apostle John writes: "Dear friends, do not believe every spirit,
but
the spirits to see whether they are from God, I test because many false prophets have gone out into
the world" (I John 4:1). John goes on to encourage his readers to test the purported revelations by their
views on Jesus; if they reject the biblical Jesus, they must be rejected as false messages, whatever their
supposed source (I John 4:2-3)."
We have only skimmed the surface of these issues concerning the historical reliability of the biblical
versus the New Age documents, but even this cursory treatment reveals their dubiousness. It should be
clear that the evidence supports the reli-ability of the New Testament, and the burden of proof weighs
heavily on any revisionist New Age claims.

The Claims of the Christ

But if the New Testament reliably informs us about the historical Jesus, what does it say? In an age of
biblical illiteracy, many are ignorant of the actual claims of Jesus recorded in the Gospels and the
daims made about him in the rest of Scripture. Ours is also an age of religious toleration and even
relativism; many resist affirmations of absolute truth. Yet the Jesus of Scripture speaks with a voice of
authority and those who submit themselves to him ascribe to him the highest degree of authority.
Jesus calls himse God's "one and only son who was sent in love by the Father to bestow etemal life
to those who believe in him (John 3:16). No other shares that status. He is unique. And this is no
academic matter, for Jesus goes onto say that "who ever does not believe [in Jesusj stands condemned
already because he has not believed in God's one and only Son" (v.18). The apostle Peter preached this
same Jesus, announcing: "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven
given to men by which we must he saved" (Acts 4:12). This covers all the bases and leaves no room for
qualification. The apostle Paul concurs by affirming that "Christ Jesus" is "the name that is above every
name" (Philippians 2:9).
Another authoritative affirmation comes from Jesus' lips: "I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6). In context, the exclusivity of this state-
ment cannot be honestly avoided, although some, through "esoteric interpretation," assert that Jesus is
not speaking of himself as the way, but of the impersonal "I am presence"(or God) in us all. Such
interpretive innovation, often practiced in New Ager circles, is the result of "world view confusion": an
entirely alien philosophy, in this case pantheism, is superimposed onto the biblical message."Yet this
method is artificial and inauthentic.
Esoteric interpretation can be countered by a good dose of common sense. If nothing stated in the text
indicates the esoteric meaning, and we have no good independent evidence indicating that the
document is written in code language, what grounds can be given to support the esoteric interpretation,
besides wishful thinking? This line of argument can be used against any number of "spiritualized"
interpretations regarding Jesus, including the separation of an impersonal Christ Consciousness from
the historical Jesus an idea totally without support in the New Testament, which claims that Jesus was
the Christ from birth (Luke 2:11). Although the Bible is not always easy to understand because of our
ignorance of the cultures and languages in which it is written, we do not need a secret code to decipher
it.20 The aposfle Peter warns of those who diston the Scriptures to their own destruction (2 Peter 3:
16).21
Many other passages single out Jesus as unique and supreme (Romans 5:15; 1 Corinthians 8:6; 1
Timothy 2:8; Philippians 2:5-11), but the assertion of Jesus as "the way" can be augmented by
argument. Claims by and about Jesus need to be substantiated through the credentials of Jesus if they
are to have real weight. As it turns out, Jesus' exclusive claims were not made in a vacuum; they were
backed up by impeccable credentials.

The Credentials of the Christ

Because those involved in the New Age movement rightly grant the reality of a paranormal, invisible
dimension that can affect the natural realm, they should be impressed with Jesus as an unsurpassed
wonder worker. Jesus as a man of miracles restored the blind, deaf, dumb and leprous, cast out demons
wit a word, commanded the elements themselves, summoned Lazarus from the grave and himself rose
from the dead. A reading of the Gospels will find not just another shaman or mystical holy man, but a
commanding presence who healed the body and soul.
The Jesus of the New Testament never claimed to tap into an impersonal realm of paranormal
power. The source of his miraculous work was, rather, his identity as God's only Son; his relationship
to God, the Father; and his empowerment by the Holy Spirit. His miracles were never frivolous or
trivial but displayed his compassion and integ-rity. Jesus is recorded as saying to a paralytic low-ered
through a roof to be near him, "Your sins are forgiven." Some thought this was odd since only God had
authority to forgive sins. But Jesus con-firmed their suspicions by proclaiming: "But that you may
know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins He said to the paralytic, "I tell you,
get up, take your mat and go home" (Mark 2:10-Il).
After this, the ex-cripple took up his mat and walked out in sight of all. Jesus had healed both soul and
body, and in the process forgiven the man's sins, declaring the prerogatives of deity.
The sheer number, power and attestation of
Jesus' miracles put him in a category by himself;
but the miracles alone are not sufficient to establish
Jesus as Lord. As the seventeenth-century writer
Joseph Glanvill (1636-1680) put it:
'Tis not the doing of wonderful things that is the only evidence that the holy Jesus was from God,
and his doctrine true; but the conjunction of other circumstances, the h&iness of his life, the rea-
sonableness of his religion, and the excellency of his designs, added credit to his works and
strengthened the great conclusion, that he could be no other than the Son of God, and Savior of the
World.22
This "conjunction of other circumstances" includes Jesus' unrivaled authority as a teacher; the certainty
of his words regarding his mission, his identity and the need for human response; his fulfillment of
prophecy;23 and his love toward those he came to rescue. These factors show Jesus as a man of
integrity and compassion as well as a man of power. He claimed to have the power to save the lost,
whom he loved.

Jesus on Human Nature

It is imperative to see Jesus' compassion in light of his assessment of human nature. In the New Age
world view, theology is anthropology: humans are divine in essence, if not in experience. Jesus, on the
contrary, taught the "humanity of humanity" and the reality of a ruined race "east of Eden." Jesus' love
cannot be reduced to the desire to see ignorant deities discover their identity and so share in his
Christhood. He declared: "The Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost" (Luke 19:10).
Jesus understood lostness as sinfulness. He catalogued thirteen items of infamy such as adultery, greed,
impurity as "coming from within" and making a person unclean (Mark 7:21-23). Where the New Age
sees a sleeping god, Jesus finds a tempest of transgression.
Jesus presented himself as the answer to the moral problem of humanity. "The Son of Man did not
come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). The language
of sacrificial atonement is often on Jesus' lips. Speaking of his impending crucifixion, Jesus said, "This
is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins" (Manhew
26:28).
Christ's crucifixion offers something alien to a New Age the&ogy, which understands God as an
impersonal and amoral Force, Principle or Vibration. From this perspective, humans all partake of the
divine essence, but the ultimate reality is imper-sonal and inhuman. The Great Void makes no friends
and sheds no blood. Yet we all yearn for loving relationships with other persons, for love, inti-macy
and acceptance.
We find our highest meaning in the interpersonal realm, not the impersonal realm. The aoss of
Christ announces God's sacrificial love toward us, not "love energy but interpersonal compassion.
God's uncomprornising holiness demands that a price he paid for sin: Jesus goes to the cross to hear
that penalty. Yet God's love provides a sinless sacrifice for a guilty' race. As the aposfie Paul said,
When we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very' rarely will anyone die for a
righteous man. though for a good man someone might possiNy dare to die. But God demon-strates
his love toward us in tis: While we
were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:6-8)
What greater demonstration of love can be imagined? What greater demonstration of power than Jesus'
literal resurrection from the grave on the third day1 as he himself predicted?25
Yet an appreciation of this love requires of us an awareness of sin. Jesus' love is nothing if not
understood as a love for sinners, those who have fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23) In
Pensees, Blaise Pascal elucidates the balance to be found in Jesus alone.
The incarnation shows man the greatness of his misery by the greatness of the remedy which he
required. . . The knowledge of Jesus Christ constitutes the middle course, because in Him we find
both God and our misery. Jesus Christ is a God whom we approach without pride and before whom
we humble ourselves without despair.26

Finding the Genuine Jesus The gospel of Jesus Christ is not a spiritual pick-me-up, but an objective
claim on every individual. Christ offers the life we crave but which we cannot achieve by looking
within. Re said: "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full" (John 10:10).
Although Jesus singled himse out of the spiritual crowd through his exclusive claims
and unmatched credentials, he issues an inclusive invitation:
Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you
and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my
yoke is easy and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:28)
Christ promises and provides rest from the futile human quest for Christhood. We may, by his grace,
become his friends, but never his peers. We must surrender our quest for autonomy, turn from our
selfishness, and turn toward the My one who can forgive our sins and give us eternal life. A dramatic
story from the Gospd of Luke illustrates this.
 Jesus was hung on the cross between two others being crucified, both convicted thieves. One openly
mocked him. The other rebuked the mocker by
saying that they deserved their punishment but Jesus had done nothing wrong. Re then turned the man
crowned with thorns and spoke nine words that would seal his eternal destiny: "Jesus, remember me
when you come into your kingdom" (Luke 23:42). Jesus did not counsel the man on the number of
reincarnations required before he too could attain Christ consciousness. Instead, Jesus replied, "I tell
you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise" (Luke 23:43).
The thief confessed his guilt, recognized the purity of the crucified one, and reached out to Jesus to
save him. We must all do the same today. If we admit our sin, repent of our wrongdoings, and put our
faith in the sinless sacrifice of Jesus, we can find eternal life-beginning now and continuing for an
eternity in paradise with Jesus. Only through faith in Jesus can a new age truly begin.
Notes
For more on the New Age as a social movement and a world view, see Douglas Groothuis, Unmasking
the New Age (Downers Grove, III.: InterVarsity Press, 1986).
'David Spangler. Reflections on the Christ (Glasgow, Scotland: Thc Findhonn Foundation, 1977),
p.103.
<Joseph Campbell. The Power of Myth (New York: Doubleday, 1988;, p. 57.
Janet Bock, The Jesus Mystery' (Los Angeles, Calif.: Aura Books, 1984), p. 112.
Mark L. and Elizabeth Clare Prophet, The Science of the spoken Word (Livingstone, Mont.: Summit
University Press. 1986). pp.86-87.
campbell. p.56.
Quoted in Otto Friedriek, "New Age Harmonies," Time, December 7.1987. p.66.
Shirley MacLaine, Going Within (New York, N.Y.: Bantam, 1989¾ p.18].
See Douglas Groothuis, Confronting the New Age (Downers Grove. HI.: InterVarsity Press, 1988),
pp.95-98. Sec Douglas Groothuis Revealing the New Age Jesus (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity
Press, 1990), pp.35-36. This is not to say that the King James Version is not reliable or that it differs
from modern translations in any substantial sense.
For more on the reliability of the New Testament see Groothuis.Revealing. pp.119-46 and F. F.
Bruce, The New Testament Documents Are They Reliable? 6th ed. (Grand Rapids. Mich.: Eerdmans,
1987).
For more on canonization see The New Testament Docu-men Cs, pp.247-S] and F. F. Bruce, The
Canon of Scripture (Downers Grove, Ill,: InterVarsity Press, 1988).
For more on the historicity of the Gnostic texts see
Groothuis, Revealing, pp.101-18.
"For more on the lost years of Jesus see ibid., pp.147-73. For more on Jesus and the Essenes see ibid.,
pp. 175-94.
Quoted in Thomas Surge, There Is a River, rev. ed. (New
York, N. Y.: Holt & Co., 1948); quoted in Gary North,
Unholy Spirits (TAer, Tex.: Dominion Press, 1986), p.204.
For more on channeling see Groothuis, Revealing, pp.195-219
and Eliot Miller, A Crash Course on the New Age (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1989), pp.141-82.
See James Sire, Scripture Twisting (Downers Grove, fll.:
InterVarsity Press, 1980), pp.23-30, 127-44. 2110n proper biblical interpretation see Gordon Fee and
Stuart
Douglas, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (London:
Scripture union, 1983;.
For more on esoteric interpretation see Groothuis, Confront.
 mg. pp.87-91 and Sire, pp.107-115.
Sadducismus-Triumpbatus (reprint, Gainesville, Ha.: Scholars Facsimiles and Reprints, 1966), p.10];
quoted in Colin Brown, Miracles and the Critical Mind (Grand Rapids. Mich: Eerdmans, 1984), p.41.
On Jesus' fulfillment of old Testament prophecy, see John Ankerberg