"About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?”
that is to say, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46)
This post continues the idea that Jesus' story is about belief & truth on trial, as explored in: The Belief on Trial Truth of Jesus' Story? As I continue to explain why I think the words of Jesus' story were not meant to be read and believed? But perceived as a spiritual diagnosis of all humanity, and a story of crucified falsehood, also known as an experience of Ego-death? Which is what I intuitively see when looking at the iconic image of Jesus' cross-of-crucifixion. As I continue to explain why I believe that major storytelling tropes, like Jesus' transfiguration, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, are not meant to be read literally, but "allegorically." If we want to understand the "hidden spiritual meaning that transcends the literal sense of a sacred text."
Like the "riddle-me-this" spiritual meaning of Jesus' famous cry from the cross; “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” Pointing out the simple spiritual truth, that God's reality, like every other form of reality is not a Word! Which I believe is the key to spiritual awakening. And I believe paradoxical statements like this one are examples of the allegorical nature of ancient storytelling, about our linguistic misconceptions of the true nature of reality. I mean; "is the true nature of your reality; WORDS?" And while Christians believe that without Jesus' resurrection there would be no Christianity.
This post suggests that without Jesus' crucifixion story, there is no developing a "Christ-mind-awareness" of how true reality hides in plain sight? Because our commonsense vocabulary is not true reality? Commonsense vocabulary is created by the reified-reality nature of language, and language creates a false sense of self and reality. Which I believe is why we read Jesus' spiritually diagnostic statement about human common-sense: "Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand," (Matthew 13:13).
And I suggest that Jesus' crucifixion story is about a need to truly understand our linguistic sense of reality. And our need to develop the balanced form of consciousness, symbolized by Jesus' cross-of-crucifixion. While as an "allegorical-interpretation" of Jesus' crucifixion, this post explores the crucifixion as a radical spiritual truth about the falsehood of our "vocabulary-is-reality" dichotomy.
Or how we confuse the communication purpose of words, with reality comprehension? As we conflate —mix together—the truth of the "sounds & symbols," nature of language, with the true nature of reality? Metaphorically crucifying the true nature of reality, because the feeling that we are defining the nature of reality with words, is an undeniable falsehood? Because truth be told, thought, spoken, and written words, are essentially metaphors. Please consider:
(Spoken and written words are essentially metaphors because they use arbitrary physical sounds or visual symbols to stand in for invisible thoughts, feelings, and objects. [1]Why Words Are Metaphors
- Symbolic mapping: A word is not the actual thing it represents. The word "tree" is a collection of sounds or letters that acts as a stand-in for a physical plant, much like a metaphor maps one idea onto another. [1, 2]
- Abstract to concrete: Humans take abstract concepts (like time, justice, or love) and use language to treat them as if they were physical, graspable things. For instance, saying "I am grasping an idea" uses a physical action to describe a mental one. [1]
Dead Metaphors in Daily Language
- Lost imagery: Many everyday words started as vivid visual comparisons but became "dead metaphors" because people use them without thinking about the original image. [1, 2]
- Historical examples: The word daisy comes from "day's eye" because the flower opens with the sun. The phrase time flies treats time as if it had wings. [1]) A Google AI Overview