YouTube: The Transformation
Eric Butterworth, Unity minister and author of the bestselling book, Discover the Power Within You, maintained that the religion of Jesus had been transformed into a religion about Jesus. I concur. The question is, what would cause this transformation?
Jesus directed his ministry to the spiritual awakening of the individual. He had no qualified trainees, no one among his inner circle who could pick up the baton. The mystic does not entertain a vision of collective enlightenment simply because, as William James pointed out, the mystical awakening “… must be directly experienced; it cannot be imparted or transferred to others.” This is an inside-out occurrence and if one is to experience it, they must have the mindset that allows it. It is made clear on several occasions that the disciples did not understand what Jesus was teaching.
The erosion of his inner-directed ministry probably began almost immediately after Jesus’ death. With their teacher and gifted seer now gone, followers relied more and more on the group as their center of guidance, power, and identity. They began moving from the narrow gate that led to self-awareness to that wider gate that opened to the security of the group dynamic. Because the focus moves away from developing a relationship to God as an internal presence, expectation becomes apocalyptic. The kingdom of God is no longer present, but it will be arriving shortly.
It is this apocalyptic hope that played into two additional pressures that confronted early followers. The most immediate of these was the increasing resistance from the Jewish majority that rejected the notion of Jesus as the Christ. The second was the Roman government.
The mystic helps the individual answer the question, “Who am I?” Answer: I am an expression of God. In contrast, a group becomes devoted to answering the question, “Who are we?” Answer: I am a Christian. With their leader gone, the focus quickly shifted from what Jesus taught to what the budding church taught about Jesus. Building a coalition of kindred spirits was a natural way of finding support against growing environmental hostilities. Thus, the Christian movement, the religion about Jesus, was born.