Happy Easter! Now as a secular non-Christian, I don’t take the Easter story literally. It’s more of an illuminating story as far as I’m concerned, positive, uplifting, but not literally true. So, from my own viewpoint, what message does Easter have for me as a Philosophical Taoist? What can a non-believer derive from a Christian story?
Well, to summarise my understanding of the story, Jesus overcomes death itself and changes things for mankind forever, however he must still ascend to heaven as his time here is done.
The message I get is one of the impermanence of things, all things change and no-one is exempt. Jesus changed things for everyone, people who supported him, even people who weren’t connected. In the Celtic legends, there is the story of a hero who at the time of the crucifixion felt it happen, and was so affected that he drew his sword and hewed down trees till the effort killed him, our actions change things, sometimes for the last people we’d expect!
There is another subtext here, stemming from the Crucifixion, Jesus has to die in order for the changes to happen. This highlights another Taoist theme, that destruction must proceed creation. Change is the creation of a new status quo, but the old order must be destroyed in order to be replaced, ths is true of every change, no exceptions. The death of Jesus is an allegory for that destruction of the old order, his rebirth for the birth of the new order.
Our third theme is his ascension into heaven, this is clearly a message that all things must end. No matter how powerful and important you are, you can’t resist change and you can’t stay on beyond your time. This reminds us to value our time here, whether you accept reincarnation or not, this incarnation is a one off and should be cherished as such, it’ll never come again.
The Easter story then, does have a message for Taoists, but then this simply shows that no matter who you are, there is a rich vein of spiritual wisdom that underpins all our beliefs.
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