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Chapter from the book by Dr.Vladimir Antonov
The Original Teachings of Jesus Christ
What Is Man
In the book Genesis of the Old Testament, there is a statement that God created man in His likeness and image. Some people, who believe that man is a body, concluded from it that God-the-Father has the appearance of a human body. And they began to picture Him in the form of an old man sitting on a cloud.
But man is not a body, man is a consciousness (a soul), a self-aware unit of conscious energy dwelling temporarily in a body or outside it. And God, too, is a Consciousness (Spirit).
An ordinary person represents a small consciousness. But God is the Infinite Ocean of Consciousness of the whole universe.
And the task of every one of us is to attain qualitative Godlikeness and sufficient growth of the amount of the consciousness, and then to flow into that Ocean and become one with It.
However, it is not enough to become intelligent and large. Man sent for self-development into the world of matter gets accustomed to living in dense spatial dimensions even without a body. And these dimensions are so distant from God-the-Father that He even cannot be seen from within them. When one lives in the non-corporeal form, one cannot move into subtle spatial dimensions. So, people-spirits, who are far from Perfection, can only know something about God, but they have never seen or experienced Him.
In order to cognize the Creator, one has to become:
a) intellectually developed — to be able to comprehend where and how to go to God, given that the Path to the Abode of the Creator is much more difficult than any path on the Earth,
b) ethically perfect — so that God allows one to approach Him, otherwise He does not allow it,
c) strong, because one needs tremendous power and stamina to move from one eon to another; the power in question is not the power of the body, but the power of the consciousness. Moreover, the consciousness has to learn to live in the state of the Creator’s subtlety. Development of the coarse power of the consciousness means movement in the direction opposite from the Creator.
The task of knowing subtle spatial dimensions is facilitated thanks to the multidimensional structure of the human organism (not of the body, but of the organism); the material body is only one of the layers of the organism. One can say that every man is represented potentially in all subtle realms. But it is not the same as what occultists describe in their books, there is no point in taking seriously the names they invented for several non-material “bodies” that every man allegedly has.
But the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19) as well as God-the-Father (1 Cor 3:16-17) indeed “dwell in us” — They abide in the multidimensional depth beneath our bodies; “the Kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21), said Jesus. And it is enough just to “dive”… But most people need years or even many incarnations for fulfilling this.
We discussed the methods of the refinement of the consciousness. It starts with the correction of the emotional sphere: getting rid of coarse emotions and cultivating subtle ones. Then one has to develop the anahata chakra and then — other structures of the organism. After this, one continues this work outside the material body, inside one’s expanded spiritual heart.
An important part of the human organism is the root (Rom 11:16,18). It is a “connection link” between the anahata chakra inside the body and the Abode of the Creator. By gradually exploring this structure of the organism and the multidimensional space around it, one may realize the fact that every incarnate person possesses a multidimensional “framework”, which one has to fill by the consciousness growing from the anahata chakra in the process of spiritual Self-realization. Having fulfilled this, one gets a possibility not only to enter the Abode of the Creator for a time but also to settle there in Mergence with Him.
Now, it is easy to understand what is meant by the statement in the Old Testament that man was created in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26-27): the human organism with its multidimensional nature represents a kind of small model of the universal multidimensional Absolute.
The human organism has a remarkable feature: the energies it receives from outside (from the material food, first of all) may be used not only for support of the vital functions of the body, but also for the growth of the consciousness. Thanks to this, the consciousness can grow in the same way that muscles grow due to the material components of the food.
Let us note that it is working muscles that grow. On the contrary, non-working muscles atrophy. It is the same with the consciousness: it grows (if it really grows and does not weaken due to dominating negative emotions or long exhausting diseases) in that spatial dimension where it works. Special work aimed at the refinement, deliverance from attachments to matter, and at the growth of the consciousness is called meditation.
All processes of the transfiguration and development of an individual consciousness are possible only in the incarnate state, for it is through the organs of the body that we obtain energy needed for these processes. In other words, the organism is a kind of factory which converts the energy contained in the matter of the food into the energy of the consciousness.
Let me stress that the growth of the consciousness can be correct or wrong. The latter happens when the consciousness grows in coarse spatial dimensions. And this process depends on our understanding of the principles and goals of our lives, on the level of cleanness from vices, on the manner of communication with other people, on the adequacy of the methods of spiritual work that we use, and even on what we eat.
As a result of the correct work on the development of the consciousness, one gets “born” in subtle spatial dimensions and “ripens” there. This is what Jesus tried to explain to Nicodemus (John 3:3,5-7): that the one who gets “born” in the Abode of the Father and even manages to “mature” there during the incarnation becomes consubstantial with the Father. Jesus said the following: “Truly, I say to you, unless you are born in the Spirit’s element, you cannot enter the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born in the Spirit is Spirit.”. But translators did not understand this statement, translated it according to their comprehension, and it became virtually impossible to understand what Jesus meant.
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