Taming the Great Villain: Judas, MetaSpiritually Interpreted
Everyone remembers Judas as the disciple who “sold out” for thirty pieces of silver, thus marking him as the greatest villain of the Bible! But in our opinion, Judas gets a bad rap! Of all the disciples, we feel Judas is the one who most understood who Jesus was and what He could do. Judas “got it” and wanted to force Jesus’ hand, to make Him use His superpowers to bring about the amazing kingdom on earth. We’d like to share a MetaSpiritual interpretation of Judas, and provide a spiritual practice for you to recognize your own “great villains” and tame them, so you can experience incredible spiritual enrichment!
The Truth is we all have a Judas quality in us. If we’re not careful, we may allow life’s circumstances to cause us to misstep like Judas did. We can betray our spiritual growth by striking the same deal Judas did.
Interpreting Judas MetaSpiritually
In esoteric symbology, silver represents the connection between us and our divine nature. It’s the Silver Cord that connects the human soul to the World Soul. Judas sold out that divine connection. That’s what the 30 pieces of silver represent. He turned Divine Order into what we call “diddlysquat order.”
Judas took a Divine Idea – Heaven on Earth – and turned it into a diddlysquat idea – he wanted to orchestrate a selfish, greedy, egotistical, violent overthrow of government. He wanted to force Jesus’ hand to make him use his superpowers to overthrow the Roman government. And there is historical evidence to support this motive.
Some scholars believe Judas was a member of the sicarii, who were a band of assassins among Jewish rebels intent on driving the Romans out of Judea. The name Iscariot means “liar” or “the false one.” It’s Syrian meaning is “assassin.” It also derives from a word that is a kind of Greek-Aramaic hybrid (Iskarioutha) that means “chokiness” or “constriction.”
As you probably know, the literal version tells us that Judas was racked with guilt once he realized the consequences of what he had done, and hanged himself. That would certainly fit with meaning of the chokiness and constriction—caused by the rope. Metaphysically, however, Judas hanging himself means ‘renouncing our attachment to covetous consumption, materialism, and greed.’ And the ‘liar, false one, and assassin’ meanings of Iscariot describe the real Villain in this story.
The notorious Villain in both the Old and New Testaments, and in all sacred writings, is none other than the shadow side of the human ego. The side that worships physical form and loves material things. Physicality is all it knows. Once it gets physical, it wants to stay physical.
Judas’ only crime was that he got excited about higher truths, and wanted spiritual pay offs,
but then resorted to materialistic means to accomplish spiritual ends.
Sound familiar? We all do it. It’s the shadow side of our ego nature: our unenlightened ego. The higher form of Judas is Judah which means ‘life-giving’ enlightenment. This higher side represents our Enlightened Ego, showing up as altruism and self-sacrifice.
As we lose our attachment to things, we find joy, and inner peace, and a sense of purpose! We move to a higher plane of living, moving, and being. We see things differently. We hear things differently. We say things differently. We do things differently.
So how do you tame the Great Villain?
To understand Judas, it is important to understand Jesus, and how He had already dealt with His Great Villain. We believe the story of Judas is the story of our evolving consciousness … and the story of Jesus is the story of increasing our awareness of our Oneness, so when we have those aha moments when we get it, and really understand the power of the Truth Principles we are embracing … we will know how to circumvent the temptations of the Villain and instead, keep our attention and focus on Spirit.
In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we read about Jesus meeting up with his “Great Villain” just before He began His ministry. Let’s set the stage: Jesus has just been baptized by John the Baptist; the dove has descended, and God’s voice has proclaimed “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” He had fully developed His Christ-consciousness, and by all indications, He was ready. But Jesus realized He had one more great task before beginning His ministry: taming the Great Villain, ensuring that His Christ consciousness was stronger than his ego, sense nature. Jesus understood that on this human plane, we will be tempted by our error thoughts, and He also demonstrated that we can make wise choices over those urges. His experience illustrates the Big Three Character Roles the Great Villain will play within our consciousness ~ Judas played opposite them, and so do we.
The Big Three Character Roles of the ‘Great Villain’:
- The desire for material things (bread into stones)
- The desire for personal recognition and approval (throw yourself off this pinnacle to prove your powers)
- The desire for power and influence over others (offered leadership and power over all the kingdoms of the world)
Do any of these sound familiar? But Jesus had a definite response to each temptation: “Get thee behind me, Satan!” In today’s language, from a MetaSpiritual perspective, He might say, “I give these thoughts NO POWER!” What a great denial statement. We are not denying the temptations exist … we are simply refusing to give any conscious power to them. When we put our spiritual life first, we find we have the wisdom to make wise choices in everything we do.
We can meet the Big Three head-on, and tame the inner Villain with these spiritual practices:
- strong denials,
- powerful affirmations, and
- a true commitment to a spiritual practice of meditation and prayer.
This isn’t something any one else can do for us … each of us must do it for ourselves. As you make that connection with your Divinity, let the “angels of Truth come and minister to you”, meet that Great Villain head-on, and know you have the power you need to transcend all error thinking and temptation, as you walk the spiritual path on practical feet!