The Tao of Christ

Having been a Christian for all of my adult life and a Baptist pastor for nearly all of that, I can say from firsthand knowledge that the essential difference between Christianity and spiritual awakening is that the first is secondhand religion and the other is direct realization. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

I receive a lot of emails from people who used to consider themselves Christians and were active in the church but no longer. They can no longer accept the literal interpretation of Scripture and the dogmatic nature of the Christian religion. They have dared to think outside the traditional Christian box, they are either been rejected by the church or feel alienated from the church and from Christianity. Some people have had spiritual experiences – glimpses of nondual reality – and are no longer comfortable with the dualistic language, theology, and rituals of the church. They are especially not comfortable with the Christian attitude that only Christians know the truth. For that reason they have left the church and explored other spiritual traditions. Yet a part of their heart is still in Christianity. A part of them misses the church, misses Jesus, and misses Christian worship and fellowship. They wish there was a way to be a part of a church but express their Christianity in a way consistent with their new broader awareness of spiritual Reality. That is the type of person who listens to my channel and many email me.The good news is that Christianity and nonduality are not incompatible. I call it Christian nonduality. In fact the original message of Jesus, whom we call the Christ, is the nondual Reality that is at the heart of all spiritual traditions.  So we can be followers of Jesus and affirm nondual awareness. But can we still be part of a church? Can we still go to worship in a church? I say yes!View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

There is a theme in both the Old and New Testaments that points to the heart of nondual awareness. It is expressed most clearly in the Book of Exodus. Moses asks to see God’s glory and God responds, “You cannot see My face; for no one shall see Me and live.” The Bible repeatedly says that no one can see God and live. God is described as holy, and no mortal can be in the presence of the holy God according to the Bible. In other words the ego – the separate self – cannot survive the presence of God. The little self is consumed in the fire of the One Self of the universe, who is God. The false self burns up in the presence of the true self. In the Presence of the One True God, the One Divine Self, all false selves disappear. There is only one Reality and that is God. This is a nondual Reality. Like a fire it consumes all others. It shakes the foundations of our lives (to use another biblical metaphor) and what remains – what is unshakeable – is Real.   View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

The common understanding of our place in the universe is that we are tiny human creatures on a planet in a solar system in the Milky Way galaxy, which is one of billions of galaxies in a vast universe. Anyone who has laid on their back on a summer evening watching shooting stars has experienced this sense of wonder at how small and seemingly insignificant our place is in the universe. There is something to be said for this state of wonder. It is a type of spiritual awe.But that is only half the story. From a physical point of view we are insignificant short-lived lifeforms in a vast universe. But there is another side of the story, a spiritual side. Together those two sides make one whole, like the Yin-Yang symbol shows two sides of a whole. From a physical point of view we are in the universe, but from a spiritual perspective the universe is in us.  View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

Sometimes I wonder if there is anything more to say in these episodes. Then I get emails from listeners which remind me there is still more to say because the gospel of nonduality is so easily misunderstood. Nondual awareness is so simple it is missed. It is so close that people don’t see it. It is hiding in plain sight. Jesus said, “The Kingdom of the Father is spread out upon the earth and people do not see it.” Tony Parsons calls it the open secret.The common mistake I hear in questions and remarks is that people assume that what they are looking for is not here now. That it is out in the future. It is one practice or one insight or one teacher or one retreat or one teaching away. Then they will get it. They assume something is lacking now. The only problem – if you want to call it that, which it really isn’t unless you see it as a problem – is that we forget who and what we are. We have spiritual amnesia. The misapprehension of our essential identity is evident in most of the questions that people ask. Alan Watts has a famous book entitled “The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are.” That title sums it up. I read it first over fifty years ago, but it was only ten years ago that I knew what he was talking about.Watts was right. People don’t know who they are. That is the problem. For that reason every question they ask comes from who they are not. In other words it is a case of mistaken identity. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

Love is still alive and well in spirituality. It is the heart of what I call Christian nonduality. Love is the way of spiritual awakening. It is the Tao of Christ, the Way of Christ.  Love may seem to be a dualistic activity because it appears to be about relationships, and relationships imply two or more, hence dual. But in actuality love transcends duality. It is an expression of unity that transcends and embraces duality.View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

It is election time in the United States. Elections always raise the issue of how nonduality is expressed in such a dualistic exercise as politics. There is no better example of duality than American politics, especially the polarized form of politics that has emerged in recent years in our country.Nonduality can be expressed in all dualistic activities, including politics. We do not have to go off into the forest or a monastery or an ashram to live a spiritual life. The apparent tension between nondual spirituality and politics is not real, because in nonduality there is no real tension. It is only apparent tension. Indeed in nonduality all dualities are resolved. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

The topic of this episode comes from a listener. He wrote in part:“Your videos are infused with insights that aid the nondualist in speaking with dualists. However, there is not (or at least I did not see) a single video that addresses these insights together. This request may seem counterintuitive: why should a nondualist need to defend themselves? Sadly, I come from a large family of Fundamentalist Christians, and I am constantly harangued because I am not a Fundamentalist. … Unfortunately, as you may imagine, I do not get very far when I share my view in this way, and so, I would benefit greatly by a video of the aforementioned suggestion.” His actual suggestion was worded as “How to talk to a dualist.” I am calling this episode “How to Speak with a Fundamentalist” but it applies to non-fundamentalist theists as well. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

There is one question I am asked often. In various ways people ask what they can do to help them wake up. In this episode I answer that question using the Book of Ecclesiastes as a source. I explore three ways of awakening: Self-inquiry, God-inquiry, and Life-inquiry. View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU

In this episode I tell some stories about idol-smashing, beginning with the Midrash about Abraham destroying the idols of his father’s idol-making workshop. In telling these stories of idol-smashing I discern the spiritual meaning behind iconoclasm. I am talking about smashing spiritual and religious and intellectual and theological and philosophical idols. Idols of the heart. The spiritual search is an iconoclastic process. In particular I address the idols of Christianity, but I also address the idols of the nondualism spiritual movement.   View Marshall's books here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Marshall-Davis/author/B001K8Y0RU