In the teachings of Christianity, which I take to include such noncanonical works such as the Gospel of Thomas, the notion of 'light' plays a preeminent role is understanding the heart of Christianity. With regard to the Zen of Christianity, like in Buddhist Zen, all activity is a revelation of spiritual light.
“It is I who am the light which is above them all. It is I who am the all. From me did the all come forth, and unto me did the all extend. Split a piece of wood, and I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there” (The Coptic Gospel of Thomas).
In the Zen of Christianity, spiritual light is active and animative. It is understood to be tabernacled in the flesh; although not being born of the flesh. Rather, this light comes from the highest which cannot even be described as God. Any attempt to describe this spiritual light is really an attempt to materialize the absolute which is immaterial like the Buddhist ‘Tathagata’ (Lit., coalesced with thatness).
For one who actualizes this light, in which it is distinguished from the flesh, he or she can be said to behold the Christ, which in Buddhism is called abhisheka, literally meaning 'anointed'.
According to the Mahayana Buddhist canon, when an anointed Bodhisattva reaches the last stage of perfection which is called the dharmamegha, roughly meaning "cloud of the dharma", he acquires a body of light. Such a body emits rays which destroy pain and misery when we witness it directly. This same body also performs many miracles. Such, is also the true body of Christ which Jesus realized. Jesus, in this wise, is a Jewish Buddha who has come into the world to remove the suffering of the multitudes (i.e., sentient beings).
Because the many sense his light inasmuch as Jesus is anointed by the light, they are freed from sin, that is, they are freed from further attachment to the corporeal body which leads to suffering. Before they saw Jesus the Anointed, they were like the dead. After they beheld the light, they were raised from the deathlike sleep of material life. This is called, in Greek, Anastasis, translated as ‘resurrection’ which is the same as Bodhi or awakening. Those who are awakened, are thus able to realize the true heavenly kingdom or, the same, the Buddhist kingdom of light, Svarga.
For anyone who really knows the purport of Zen, it is easy to see it in Christianity and especially in Gnostic Christianity. But for those attached to the person of flesh, even imagining their saviors to be such, there is only rebirth which always ends in death. Any true religion must teach the deathless light which is immaterial. But more importantly, it must teach the recognition of that which animates the body of flesh which is intrinsically free of the flesh. The very notion of personal salvation tells everyone the good news that we are potentially free from that which forever binds us to rebirth, namely, this body. When we turn to the light which animates us, instead of the flesh which is animated, only then are we truly saved.
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