Book Review: Deepak Chopra’s Jesus – Christianity as a Path to Enlightenment

I have to admit, Deepak Chopra had me at the subtitle of his novel Jesus, officially out today. The subtitle is ‘A Story of Enlightenment’ – the same subtitle he used for his novel of the Buddha’s life, released last year. Since my entire approach to spirituality is cross-denominational, and I believe the mystic branches of all the world religions are paths to spiritual enlightenment, I was predisposed to like Chopra’s version of the lost years of Jesus’ life. And in his preface Chopra is very straightforward about his purpose in writing this book, saying “[there is] a Jesus left out of the New Testament – the enlightened Jesus. His absence, in my view, has profoundly crippled the Christian faith, for…making [Jesus] the one and only Son of God leaves the rest of humankind stranded…What if Jesus wanted his followers – and us – to reach the same unity with God that he had reached?”

‘Crippled’ is a strong word, and this book will undoubtedly anger many. Yet Chopra’s Jesus maintains the divinity at the heart of mainstream Christianity – he is not just some average Joe who happens upon God. Nor is he simply a spiritual teacher or ‘guru’, as other Eastern teachers have characterized him. From a young age others recognize a special quality in Chopra’s Jesus, and this separates him in a way that both fuels and challenges his spiritual faith. The novel mostly covers the years of Jesus’ life left out of the Bible – the years in which he transforms from a serious and insightful young man into the son of God – and throughout that period he is surrounded by signs of his future divinity.

Jesus himself is not comfortable with these signs, but they draw others to him. The early part of Jesus’ spiritual journey is dominated by his relationships with Mary Magdelene and Judas – both of whom of course feature prominently in the later part of his life, as told in the New Testament. Chopra’s earlier versions of these figures each have delusions about Jesus, and want to possess him for their own purposes. Judas wants to use Jesus to inspire his own band of Jewish followers in their rebel fight against the Romans, and Mary wants him for personal love and fulfillment. Jesus struggles to understand what each wants from him, and is tempted by what they have to offer. It is through them that he comes to understand the human condition, and the forces – both external and internal – that prevent many from pursuing a deeper relationship with God.

Ultimately, Jesus comes to see the spiritual power in ego surrender, telling Judas “We’ve both struggled to be first…Now we’ve been shown the way out…How can we discover God’s will unless we give up our own?” Soon after, Jesus leaves his early companions, and ventures to the Essenes, a mystic Jewish religious community now believed by many to have authored the Dead Sea Scrolls. Jesus stays with the Essenes for five years, revered by them as the Jewish Messiah. But ultimately Jesus disappoints them also, as he will not conform to their view of him. He insists that God wishes to save all, not just the Jews, and tells the Essenes “All you’ve ever wanted from me is to save the Jews. The Jews cannot be saved as long as the world is what it is. We need a new world, nothing less.”

After leaving the Essenes, Jesus travels to a mysterious holy man in distant mountains, also the story’s narrator. Although the teacher is left unnamed, he clearly calls to mind classic Himalayan spiritual masters and hermits, and it is here that the path of Chopra’s Jesus most closely resembles that of his Buddha. Both struggle with their concepts of good and evil, and both are tempted by demons with promises of greatness. They both come to understand they must abandon all concepts and personal identity to truly allow God to work through them. As Jesus’ mysterious teacher tells him, “Only someone who can see the demons as part of God is free. Good and evil dissolve. The veil drops away, and all you see is divine light – inside, outside, everywhere…Your soul is the world’s soul. In your resurrection will be the resurection of the world.”

Jesus’ awakening is powerfully told, and the new Jesus returns to his homeland as an agent of enlightenment. Encountering Judas and Mary once again, he transmits a grace that literally wipes away their past. Or, as Mary puts it when asked ‘what has he done to me’ by others who receive Jesus’ grace, “He killed who you were, so that who you are can be reborn.”

Chopra’s Jesus is not a perfect book. Scenes change rapidly, and many conversations seem stunted in a way that occasionally left me disoriented. But it conveys a profound message in an accessible and passionate voice (something I can’t always say about Chopra’s nonfiction.) If you are interested in considering a new vision of Christianity, and of all religions, give it a read, and consider reading Buddha as well.

You can purchase this book on Amazon, or for more book reviews, go to the Books page. To learn more about Deepak Chopra, try the Heroes of Healing site, an online directory of contemporary spiritual teachers, healers, and authors.

Heroes for Healing – Online Guide to Contemporary Spiritual Teachers, Healers, and Authors

The Heroes for Healing online group writing project has launched at its permanent location. With contributions by many different bloggers and guest writers, this directory profiles dozens of contemporary spiritual healers, teachers, and authors. Videos, book recommendations, website links, and personal comments by the writers are included. Visit today and find some new inspiration for yourself, and of course, don’t forget to !

Update on Heroes for Healing Project

I’m happy to report that the Heroes for Healing group writing project is still growing, with recent new posts on Esther and Jerry Hicks, Byron Katie, and Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Posts on Deepak Chopra, Thich Nhat Hahn and others are on their way. Eckhart Tolle, Oprah Winfrey, Wayne Dyer and others are up on the site of Jenny Mannion, the generous creator of this project. You can contribute by writing your own post, commenting on existing ones, or publicizing this project. Visit the master list for guidelines, or my own contributions.

Considering that this Sunday is International Peace Day, also consider getting involved in one of the many peace efforts occurring this weekend. I am organizing a peace meditation from 8-9AM PST that day.

Book Review: Deepak Chopra’s Why is God Laughing?

I picked up Deepak Chopra’s latest fiction effort, Why is God Laughing?: The Path to Joy and Spiritual Optimism, with high hopes. I generally like Chopra’s work, although I am not a hard-core fan, and I love to laugh. I also believe humour is a key companion to spiritual growth – when you can laugh at yourself, you probably have hit on some self-truth. And Mike Myer’s Foreword seemed to be heading in the right direction, quoting Lenny Bruce’s  equation for comedy as “laughter = pain + time”, and noting that Chopra would call the ‘plus time’ detachment. Enlightenment and comedy share that in common.

Unfortunately Why is God Laughing? doesn’t quite follow-through on its promise, although it has some nice moments. The main problem for me is that the book seems more like an outline, and a derivative one at that. It doesn’t evoke any powerful emotions, because we don’t have enough time with the main character, Mickey, to feel invested in him. The entire book feels rushed, more like a premise for hitting certain spiritual points, chapter by chapter. These points, or lessons, drive the book’s progression more than the character’s inner growth. This is often a problem when non-fiction writers cross over to fiction, but I thought Chopra had solved it after his last fiction effort, Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment (recently released in paperback, and which I highly recommend.)

Why is God Laughing? revolves around Mickey Fellows, a famous, self-absorbed Los Angeles comedian whose father has recently died. As he struggles with his grief, a mysterious stranger appears in his life and starts providing him with boilerplate spiritual lessons – overcoming fear, seeing beyond ego, embracing humility, etc. In format the book seems to follow in the footsteps of Dan Millman’s Way of the Peaceful Warrior; in fact it is kind of a cross between Way of the Peaceful Warrior and Tuesdays with Morrie, which should be a winning combination, but it just falls short of both in emotional depth.

Chopra is at his best in this book when speaking through the mysterious teacher, as it gives him a chance to expound on his usual spiritual themes. There is no question that he is a master at communicating usually complex ideas in simple nuggets. Some of my favorites are:

“Either you’re a person wondering if you have a soul, or you’re a soul that knows being a person isn’t real.”

“Your soul and your ego are as invisibly mixed as white wine and water…[people] wander through life searching for their soul when it’s right there all the time. They talk about losing their soul when that’s totally impossible.”

“Before, what you experienced was personal happiness. It was based on having a reason to be happy and no reason to be sad. But happiness based on a reason can be snatched away from you at any moment. Now you are happy without a reason. That’s far more durable…”

Throughout his spiritual journey, Mickey experiments with humour. The state of his humour becomes symbolic of where he is in his process of awakening. When he is self-absorbed or self-pitying, his jokes are often crude or based on putting down others, and they fall flat. As he progresses, his jokes come from a lighter, more joyful place within himself, and become funnier. That’s the idea anyway, which I like in theory, but I didn’t personally find many of the jokes funny, at least not in print, so the whole humour aspect of the book didn’t quite work for me.

Chopra’s epilogue is interesting, as he lays out his own ideas on how to embrace joy and optimism while living in a scary, fear-based culture. If the story doesn’t grab you, you can always jump straight to the epilogue for a good Chopra fix. The bottom line is, the themes of this book are true to his usual message, and clearly presented – it just doesn’t work as a novel. So you probably won’t be deeply disappointed, but you won’t be deeply moved either. If you don’t want to risk it, just buy Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment instead.

For other book reviews on this blog, go to the Book category.