Mindfulness in the Christian vision is to ‘let that same mind be in [us] that was in Christ Jesus’ (Phil 2:5). The mystics are those who ‘have the mind of Christ’ (1 Cor. 2:16). Why begin with Jesus? Jesus didn’t begin with himself but imitated the Father. ‘Very truly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing’ (Jn 5:19). The Apostle Philip implored as we might, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied’ (14:8). Jesus replies by pointing back to his non-duality with the Father, ‘Whoever has seen me has seen the Father’ (14:9). That doesn’t necessarily help, we cannot see Jesus in his bodily form, he now dwells ‘in an unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see’ (1Tim 6:16). If the dwelling is unapproachable how much more so the one who dwells in it. So we have to begin where we can, in what the Gospels say about Jesus’ life and teaching. Jesus is the completely other-centred person, centred on the Father. His whole being is a response to another. It is this openness that makes him much more than a historical figure, more than a mystic. Christians believe his relationship to God was so unique that he fully expressed God; he was ‘the Word of God’. His othercenteredness means he is not just a model to emulate, but also a teacher who dwells within. He is the ground of our being, ‘all things were made through him’ (Jn 1:3). He is ‘the true light that enlightens everyone’ (1:9). Enlightenment in the Christian vision is knowledge of Jesus.
Pontius Pilate
asked Jesus sardonically ‘What is truth?’ (18:38). The modern mind tends to be
sceptical if not downright cynical about anything that presents itself as the
truth, or as truthful. Are the Gospels ‘mere myth’, fabrications of Jesus’
followers? There are inconsistencies between the accounts of Jesus’ life.
Still, considering the Gospels derived from different communities of early
Christians and different geographical contexts, the consistency is remarkable.
The search for the historical Jesus is only possible through the memory of the
Gospels. They do not claim scientific, or even journalistic, standards of
accuracy. They tell a story. A story, which until it was written down had been
an oral memory of those who knew Jesus, passed down within communities.
Four gospels
became the official canon of the New Testament in the fifth century. Other
written narratives about Jesus survive. Before looking at them a brief
introduction to the official four: Three, known as The Synoptic Gospels, were
composed between AD 70–90 (or CE). Mark was probably the first composed,
Matthew uses a lot of Mark and more, and Luke draws from some still
unidentified common source of all three. All are written in Greek. Matthew
seems to have written for Jewish Christians and there is some polemic in his
Gospel against Gentile Christians who didn’t follow the Jewish law. Mark
probably wrote for Roman Christians, Luke for Christians in Greece and Syria.
Speaking to different communities they show different perspectives. Their
diversity rests on a remarkable unity of vision though, which has prompted
scholars to search for a common source document ‘Q’, which has never appeared.
None of the Gospels are a direct first- hand record of any eyewitness to Jesus;
they witness to an oral tradition.
The Gospel
according to John is more of a theological commentary on memories about Jesus’
life. It has been called the ‘mystical Gospel’, but this does not mean the
facts are mythical. Theology is added to real reminiscences to bring out new
and deeper meanings. It was probably written between AD 80–100 in Ephesus or
Syria in a Hellenistic Jewish mentality. The style is more poetic, the tone of
Jesus’ teaching voice more solemn than in the synoptics. The contradictions
with the earlier Gospels in the chronology of Jesus’ ministry does not change
the nature of the faith professed. This is also the case with some other
accounts like the Gospel of Thomas, rediscovered in 1945 in an earthenware jar
in Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt. Fifty per cent of the sayings of Thomas are
found in the Synoptic Gospels. Elaine Pagels believes they were recorded at
much the same time as John’s Gospel and in a similar geographic area – around
Syria. Conflict between the two visions of Christian mysticism, and the
eventual triumph of the Johannine account of Jesus, may explain why the sayings
recorded in Thomas were edged out of the canon.
A refrain in
all Gospel accounts is, ‘Be on your guard, stay awake, because you never know
when the time will come’ (Mk 13:33, Lk 21:36). In Matthew Jesus says it could
be any day, any hour (24:42 & 25:13). When Jesus is betrayed and arrested
in the garden of Gethsemane he says ‘the hour is at hand’, his disciples ‘could
not stay awake with [him] one hour’ (26:40 & 45). Wakefulness must be a
daily programme, an hourly effort. It comes to a crux in times of calamity.
Simone Weil (1909–1943) says that at the time of testing compassion becomes the
driving force of attentiveness. The present moment occasions the place where we
arrive at openness to God and neighbour, but Weil believed it was only in a
state of affliction, in extreme suffering, that we are stripped of past and
future. Our minds range backwards and forwards because of the difficulty they
have in being with what is ‘at hand’. Wakefulness starts with acceptance of the
present moment; its fruit is right action motivated by compassion. Mindful
living involves linking what we are doing with being in the moment, knowing, as
Jesus is about not postponing the decisive moment when we respond to the need
of another. To be mindful, therefore, we have to be open to the experience of
others, especially their troubles. ‘Today it is not really enough to be a
saint,’ Weil writes, ‘we must have the saintliness demanded by the present
moment, a new saintliness, itself without precedent.’1 Its newness is its
emphasis on embodiment as the way to discover the difference between responding
and reacting. Reacting comes from our pre-set aversion or attraction to what
life presents. Responding involves living with compassion. To really be with
someone means being physically present. Jean Vanier asks:
How can we bring news that is truly good
to the poor and the dispossessed? It is not by telling each person: ‘God loves
you’. It is by saying ‘I love you in the way Jesus does’. That is what it means
to be present to them in the flesh, because it was in the flesh that Jesus was
present to the poor and told them ‘I love you in the way God does’.
This is an
extract from Living With The Mind of Christ by Stefan Gillow Reynolds, available now in paperback, priced
£12.99.
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