Hi Happy Genius:

An interesting article, certainly. "The more we know, the less we know," is what I retained as the outstanding statement.

Jesus appears to have been a legend already in his own time. After his death, the legend grew, and elements of mythology were added. It is impossible now to separate the legendary and mythological Jesus from the historical Jesus. But there is some fascinating scholarly research, and it certainly is interesting to speculate about the historical Jesus.

For me, Jesus Christ is an archetype for universal unity and unitive love. My relationship with this archtype is personal. After a winter spent in meditation and contemplation, I prayed to Jesus Christ for a revelation of God. What I subsequently experienced was utter blackness, then an unfolding of bubbles of light in inverse and outward quantum leaps (both inverse and outward in the same space) Part of that bubble continuum was then ripped into chaos and from the chaos emerged the world as we know it. In six sacred hours I saw—or rather was—a replay of cosmic creation, from nothing to the world of today.

To me, the Christ spirit is the spirit of unity and synthesis. To me, God is unitheistic: the self-creative totality of being in a state of synthesis. I think Jesus was one of those mystical prophets who experienced the unity that underlies all diversity. Most of all, though, Jesus experienced the universal, unitive love that is an inevitable outcome of the unitive experience. I think his "kingdom" is the experience and enactment of universal unity and unitive love.

I think the general principle in Christianity has been to inflate the human whilst diminishing the divine. We have generally liked to think more in terms of our ascendancy, our rising intellectual, spiritual accomplishment, whilst trying to fit God into a back pocket. God scares the bejesus out of us if God is not a finite, male, toy for us to manipulate in our own interests. We love to think God is on OUR side meaning, not the side of humanity, or the side of conscious life on earth, or even on the side of life anywhere in the universe (which might be a way for us to start approaching Truth)... but on the side of our penny-pinching, tawdry, shallow, greedy little suburban pretensions to something called the good life... OUR good life.

Rather than reflecting in awe on the vastness of mystery and our vulnerability before God and creation, and feeling reverence, we have used the prophets and messiahs to magic up and enhance our perceptions of ourselves.

We become "saved" by attributing to Jesus powers over God that even he is on record as having denied.  So Jesus becomes a magic amulet: we rub Jesus (believe in, or pray to, or make holy), in order to get off the hook of the Mystery that God presents us with. In doing so we make it impossible to connect in any helpful way with Christ or God. Itès no wonder there are atheists about.

Of course, our fatuous self-esteem, the misconceptions we have about our knowledge of the way it all works, is pushing a third of living creation rapidly towards extinction -- life forms that either took 3.8 billion years to evolve or were created by a God who then declared them good. Whichever way you interpret the awe-inspiring diversity and beauty of life on Earth, it is extremely difficult to get away from the monstrous conclusion that we are busily engaged in some serious screwing up. And that our lack of religious attachment, comprehension or integrity is a contributing factor, as it our bending of science to self-interest and the selective attention we pay to its findings.

Maybe it is time to let go with a bit more awe, attention and reverence, and a bit less control-freakery. 

quote=MikePaterson]

I think the general principle in Christianity has been to inflate the human whilst diminishing the divine.

[/quote]

I am going to read the rest of your post. But this stopped me. It is so true, and yet the idea of 'diminishing the divine' is a puzzle and is saddening. In this world of increasing complexity in all fields of endeavor- I find my awe-ability has grown a lot. And with me, this augments the divine. Thinking of Jesus as a mystic  prophet I  am delighted with the (continuing) search for 'The historical Jesus'. Perhaps the divine is everywhere but lumpted up in Jesus. (I refuse to be solumn.) OK, condensed, then.

Whew! I hate it when my resume is made public. Yep My religon involves me me me. MY future. MY lucky charm. And God as He relates to ME. Pretty stupid when you think about it.  And you just made me think about it.. THAT admitted aformentioned awe does, thought agree with

If I have a defense it's that I pretty much juggle both; after all, it is I who has the awe.I

I know nothing of this. ..BUT, looking ahead just a little I see 'fatuous self esteem' lies ahead...(sigh)..  

Of course, our fatuous self-esteem, the misconceptions we have about our knowledge of the way it all works, is pushing a third of living creation rapidly towards extinction -- life forms that either took 3.8 billion years to evolve or were created by a God who then declared them good. Whichever way you interpret the awe-inspiring diversity and beauty of life on Earth, it is extremely difficult to get away from the monstrous conclusion that we are busily engaged in some serious screwing up. And that our lack of religious attachment, comprehension or integrity is a contributing factor, as it our bending of science to self-interest and the selective attention we pay to its findings.

I learn of these extinctions with wonder and just think! Is a few year there will be no lions. No lions! None. Some how that in some way, (Metro Goldwin Mayor?) hit me hard...it seems to scream "Fire" --to the deaf.

The world is turning faster, time is increasing it's pace...

What we need is luck and some of God's grace.

I think it's interesting how ancient gods and legends -- all that once animated whole mythologies -- got turned into fairy tale characters and nursery songs and became kidstuff... where what little is left can probably still sway human values.

I may be wrong, but I see that sort of thing happening more and more with "Bible stories" -- they are getting increasingly simplified, excerpted and moving towards "fairyland" and children's stories. It is a slow process but, while we see Christmas and Easter as especially "commercialised", maybe these themes and characters are also also rendered down to provide entertainment for kids. (They probably won't last long there, given the nature and trends of kiddy entertainment these days).