The Electric Jesus: The Healing Journey of a Contemporary Gnostic (cont.)
By Jonathan Talat Phillips

Literalist Christians refused to accept that the rites of the mystery schools form the central narrative of The New Testament. But the similarities are too plentiful to ignore. Jesus encounters a baptism (spiritual cleansing), a eucharist (communion), an anointing (“Christ” means “the anointed one”) and the death and resurrection ritual. These mystical rites provided a rare alchemical education, unifying spiritual energies (pneuma, as the early Christians called it) for candidates. In the words of The Gospel of Philip, one of the so-called Gnostic texts, “The Lord did everything in a mystery, a baptism and a chrism, and a eucharist and a redemption and a bridal chamber. […] he said, ‘I came to make the things below like the things above, and the things outside like the things inside. I came to unite them in the place.”

The word “mystery” appears twenty-seven times in The New Testament with Paul telling fellow Christians, “Let a man regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of God.” Jesus speaks of clandestine teachings for those in the inner circles when he says to his disciples, “You have been given the secret of God’s imperial rule; but to those outside everything is presented in parables.” (Mathew 4:11)

As an energy healer, I found myself especially drawn to how early Christians utilized pneuma for personal transformation. Jesus baptizes with “fire and spirit,” heals with “power,” and transmits wisdom to his disciples through the “bubbling spring” drawn from a higher source. The purpose of these schools was to create Pneumatics, people full of spiritual energy. In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus announces to his disciples, “Whoever drinks from my mouth will become like me; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him.”

Even common Christian terms revealed clues to this ancient transformational process. I studied the original Greek word for “sin,” Harmatia, which turned out to be an archery term meaning “missing the mark.” It lacked the guilt and shame pastors used to control their flocks and simply indicated when seekers strayed from their path and needed to get back on course. Similarly, the Hebrew word Satan (“adversary”) highlighted the ego/personality attachment the soul needed to overcome in order to reach higher states of consciousness.

Repent (metanoia) meant to “change one’s mind” or “have a shift in consciousness,” which can occur when absorbing higher frequencies from someone closely connected to source-energy, like Jesus. Most surprisingly, Christ was not our Lord and “savior” but rather our “soter,” meaning “healer,” “bestower of health,” or “one who makes whole.” Staying connected to universal spirit, Jesus travels through the rift of separation consciousness to heal us and bring us back to our celestial home. “I am the one who comes from what is whole” (Gospel of Thomas). When we finally release our attachments to the material realm, we become “redeemed” (apolytrosis), meaning “released.”