If you are looking for a spiritual or metaphysical interpretation of the people, places, and things related to the Nativity story, this is the blog article for you!
We believe the Christmas story is our story. It is the drama of the birth of our awakening to the Truth that we are the Christ expressing at the point of us. Metaphysically, it represents a transformation in consciousness. It is a moment of enlightenment, an interior journey of the growing awareness of our unfolding Christhood. In this article, we provide a metaphysical snapshot of our spiritual unfoldment. Metaphysically speaking, all of the people, places, and events in the Bible represent qualities, traits, habits, and abilities within us. We hope you’ll like our MetaSpiritual treatment of the Christmas story.
Christmas represents the birth of our awareness that the Christ Presence has expressed Itself as our Higher Self. And like Jesus — or any other awakened human being — we can grow into our conscious Christhood (Buddhahood, Krishnahood, etc.) by following the same inner compass enlightened beings use to find their way Home.
We believe humankind’s unwillingness to embrace this truth has caused us to miss many opportunities for both inner peace and world peace. The majority of humankind has missed the true purpose of their lives— which is to be the best Christ (Buddha, Krishna, etc.) they can be. They’ve neglected the true meaning of Christmas.
One of the most inconvenient spiritual truths of all time is this: The Only Begotten Son born in a manger to Joseph and Mary is the same Only Begotten Son born as our Higher Self in each of us. It is the Christ Presence (the One Reality) involuting Itself as our super-consciousness so we evolve (unfold) once again into our True Cosmic Nature!
Some History
Matthew was the first Christian writer to suggest that Jesus had a miraculous virgin birth. The tradition of Jesus’ virgin birth was simply unknown in Jewish scriptures prior to Matthew’s decision to include it in his gospel. Matthew adopted Greek and Mediterranean myths widely known for claiming virgin births in their mythology. Matthew borrows his child birth story from Isaiah 7:14 and misquotes Isaiah: The Hebrew word Isaiah uses to describe the birth is ‘almah’ which simply means ‘woman and not ‘bethulah’ which means ‘virgin.’
There’s also disagreement among Biblical scholars as to what time of year the nativity supposedly occurred – winter or spring. It’s not necessary for us to cover that controversy because, as we’ve mentioned above, the ‘virgin birth’ is a universal archetype of spiritual awakening that heralds the ‘initial birth’ of our realization that our True Nature is our Christ Nature (Divine Nature). So, once we are truly dedicated to our spiritual growth and enlightenment, the ‘virginal awareness’ of our Divine Nature can come at any time of the year!
A MetaSpiritual Interpretation of the Christmas Nativity Story
What follows is a metaphysical snapshot of that spiritual unfoldment. MetaSpiritually speaking, all of the people, places, and events in the Bible represent qualities, traits, habits, and abilities within all of us:
- Census: A time when all of the beliefs, values, and assumptions that characterize sense consciousness are called into question through our personal introspection and spiritual growth
- Inn: Represents the unenlightened intellect which has no room for higher spiritual teachings or insights
- Cave: The womb-like mystery of life which gives birth to form and higher consciousness
- Manger: Represents baser human emotions and limited intellectual awareness of our true Divine Nature which is associated with our human personality
- Swaddling Clothes: The confinement and limitations imposed by physicality
- Nazareth: State of awareness in which we center our thoughts on spiritual things instead of material things
- Galilee: Subconscious feelings and emotions which sense spiritual truths, but repress them
- Bethlehem: The abiding place (the mystical 4-Square City, our heart) of Universal Substance (bread)
- Jerusalem: State of inner peace, a consciousness filled with the peace which passes all misunderstanding
- Judah (Judea): Acknowledgement of our oneness with our God Essence (the Eternal Presence, the One Reality, the Infinite Isness, the All, etc.)
- Egypt: Coma consciousness (sense or material consciousness)
- Mary: Represents our pure, maternal, and superior intuition which is unequivocally open and receptive to Divine Ideas. (Like Eve, Mary symbolizes our right hemisphere)
- Joseph: Represents our dutiful and trusting intellect which is characterized by superior wisdom and understanding. The intellect finds it difficult to give birth to divine ideas, it can only protect them and nurture them through disciplined spiritual practice. (Joseph, like Adam, represents our left hemisphere)
- Elizabeth: Mature spiritual unfoldment characterized by faith, trust, love, and confidence in intuitive promptings
- Zechariah: Attuned intellectual understanding that evidences our becoming aware of the deeper spiritual implications of truth teachings
- Infant John (later known as John the Baptizer): Growing moral awareness of our need to prepare ourselves and others for responsible spiritual growth
- Angels: Higher thoughts, insights, and inclinations which come from a consciousness grounded in Truth principles
- Gabriel: Spiritual discernment which allows our Divine Nature to guide us
- Christ Child: The birth of our conscious awareness that we are the Christ Presence expressing Itself as us in human form (the Holy Grail, the Philosopher’s Stone, the Fountain of Youth, Pure Consciousness)
- Shepherds: The humble, trustworthy, natural thoughts we have that ‘watch over’ our good and obedient intentions (sheep)
- Animals (Donkey, Ox, Sheep, Lamb, Dove, etc.):
– donkey: Humility, courage, persistence;
– ox: infusion of cosmic and spiritual forces;
– sheep: obedient intentions;
– lamb: purity, innocence, harmlessness;
– camel: strength, endurance, and perseverance;
– turtledove: fidelity, love;
– dove: purity, gentleness and peace - Wise ‘Men’: The esoteric knowledge and superior spiritual insights that make us open and receptive to our Christ Nature. (Eastern traditions say that there were at least 12 magi and that they came from all over the East, the Mid-East, Europe, and Africa. Magoosheh is the Aramaic word for ‘magi.’ Its root derives from the Babylonian and Persian word magno which means ‘receptivity.’ We get our words magnetic and magic from those derivations. The wise men – and women – represent our alchemical, astrological, scientific, psychic, mystical and prophesying natures).
- Herod: Our egocentric willfulness characterized by its paranoia and material aggrandizements (It is the ‘secular city’ that fosters our repeated incarnations)
- East: Our innate Divine Nature, Higher Self, our super-consciousness, our Spiritual IP Address (the ancient Garden of Eden).
- Star: The spark of precognition (universal knowing) within us that prompts our receptivity to our divine nature
- Gold: Our ability to transform material consciousness into spiritual awareness so that our possessions do not possess us
- Frankincense: Its physical expression is incense. It symbolizes insperiences like: affirmative prayer, meditation, positive affirmations, visualizations, mantras, mystical experiences, etc.
- Myrrh: Symbolizes letting go of anything which no longer serves our highest good. It reminds us to let negative, self-defeating thoughts, attitudes, habits and behaviors die so we better align ourselves with our Divine Nature.
- Simeon: Our intellectual openness to the truth that our Real Self is the Christ Self
- Anna: Our emotional readiness to subordinate our human personality to our Christ individuality
- Virgin Birth: Represents the undefiled and purified stillness of mind in us which gives birth to our awareness of the Christ Pattern (For an in-depth article about the Virgin Birth, including a history of virgin births and our MetaSpiritual interpretation, see our Membership Website (The Global Center for Spiritual Practices)
- Immaculate Conception: When our intuitive intelligence, love, and receptivity to our innate divinity are raised to their highest and purest spiritual essences, we immaculately conceive a pure, inviolate Christed Idea.
- Nativity Event: When we reach a certain stage of spiritual development, our divinely-inspired intuitive abilities spring into action (immaculately conceive) because of our new born Christ awareness (virgin birth).
As you meditate on this interpretation of the people, places, and things associated with the Nativity, what does Christmas mean to you? Scroll down to the “Leave a Reply section, and share your 1-2 sentence description of the meaning of Christmas, from your heart!
Blessings for a Merry Christmas!
