The Jesus Savior Program and Reclaiming Christ

How Literalism, Fear, and Religious Dogma Corrupted the Inner Path to the Divine

By Bernhard Guenther, July 20, 2025

The Bible as a Tool of Control

The Bible is one of the most widely edited and revised scriptures in history.

It’s a compilation of texts shaped over centuries through translation, interpretation, political agendas, and doctrinal shifts, marked by thousands of manuscript variants, edits by authoritarian church councils, and countless additions and deletions.

This doesn’t mean its core spiritual truths are invalid, but it does mean that taking it as the literal, inerrant “word of God” is naïve at best, and manipulative at worst.

There’s a saying: “If God wrote the Bible, then the Devil edited it.”

The Lost Esoteric Tradition Hidden in Scripture

Much of what’s called “heresy” today was once sacred knowledge held by initiates.

Before the rise of authoritarian religion, Christianity shared a common esoteric foundation with the ancient mystery schools of India, Egypt, and Greece.

James M. Pryce describes this forgotten inner tradition in The Apocalypse Unsealed over a century ago:

“Every thoughtful student of the literature of the ancient religions, including that of early Christianity, cannot but be impressed by the fact that in each and all of them may be found very clear intimations of a secret traditional lore, an arcane science, handed down from times immemorial.

This secret body of knowledge is repeatedly alluded to in the New Testament, as also in the Upanishads and other ancient writings, in whose pages a few of the arcane doctrines are cautiously unveiled; and from the meagre glimpses thus afforded of the system it is clearly apparent that it was essentially the same in all the old religions and philosophies, constituting, in fact, their common esoteric basis.

In the primitive Christian Church, organized as a secret society, this Gnosis, or secret science, was guarded with jealous care, being imparted only to a comparative few who were deemed worthy of initiation, according to the maxim, “Many are the called, but few are the chosen.”

Through corrupting political influences and the ultimate dominance by a selfish and decadent priesthood, the Christian Society in the early centuries lost this esoteric knowledge, in place of which there grew up during the succeeding centuries a system of dogmatic theology formulated from the literal interpretation, the dead letter, of the books of the Old and New Testaments.

On the hypothesis that the Bible, as a divine revelation, contains a record of God’s dealings with mankind throughout the ages, the historical element in it has been unduly emphasized, while books that are purely allegorical and mystical have been construed as history.”

– The Apocalypse Unsealed: Being an Esoteric Interpretation, James M. Pryce, 1910

One of the most significant corruptions in the Bible was the removal of the concept of reincarnation, along with the understanding of karma and soul evolution across lifetimes.

In esoteric Christianity, before the rise of organized religion, reincarnation and soul evolution were integral to the original teachings. These teachings were rooted in the universal law of cause and effect operating across lifetimes.

We have explored this topic from the perspective of Esoteric Christianity in our recent podcast, available here.

The “Jesus Savior” Matrix Control Program

According to the modern, literalist interpretation of Christian doctrine, you are born in sin, live one life, and are judged by God to either go to heaven or hell, based on whether you’ve accepted Jesus as your personal savior.

This is the ultimate religious matrix control system.

The verse “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6) has become one of the most powerful tools of religious social population control when taken literally and dogmatically, rather than understood through its esoteric meaning.

This phrase is a cornerstone of the “Jesus Savior” matrix program.

It teaches that only those who believe in Jesus (as a historical figure, within a specific doctrinal framework) and accept him as “the savior” will be saved and go to heaven.

Many Christians who hold this view also claim that no other path, religion, or practice can bring the soul back to God, only Jesus. If you don’t accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, you’re doomed to eternal damnation.

This creates deep fear, guilt, and dependency, which makes people easily controlled.

Historically, this literal interpretation has been used to justify violence, witch burnings, and the brutality of missionary crusades.

Today, this dogma has returned in force, with “reborn” Christians claiming that reincarnation is “New Age nonsense” and that yoga and meditation are “demonic.”

On the other side of the delusional spectrum, there’s the “reincarnation is a trap” and “Earth is a prison planet” black-pill fringe narrative, which I’ve written about before HERE.

This is the real inversion: the corruption of genuine spirituality through religion, and how billions have been led to believe that a book, edited, copied, translated, and revised over centuries, is the literal word of God.

People take isolated verses at face value without understanding their esoteric symbolism.

The Esoteric Meaning of “I am the way…”

In esotericism, the statement “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” is not a call to believe in a historical figure as the “savior”. It’s a symbolic teaching about the inner path of awakening the Divine Presence within, the Christ principle that lives in all beings.

“I AM” refers to the Divine Spark within, the eternal presence of God embedded in the soul.

“The way” refers to the inner journey of purification through esoteric psycho-spiritual work and conscious inner transformation, which brings forth the true Self. It is the path (way) to the kingdom within, the sacred process of aligning with the soul and integrating and transmuting the lower nature.

“The truth” is gnosis, not to be confused with Gnosticism, but direct spiritual knowledge and experience of one’s Divine nature. It cannot be taught by doctrine or proven through theological debate. The mind and words are often in the way of inner realization.

“The life” is the soul-infused life. Not mechanical existence through the conditioned ego-personality, attached to its desires, but the living current of Spirit flowing through a consciously awakened being rooted in Essence, the true Self.

“No one comes to the Father except through Me” means that only by awakening and embodying the inner Christ, the Divine “I AM” within, can one return to union with the Divine Source. This union manifests as a unique expression of God’s Will, fully spiritualized in body, mind, and life. This is the true resurrection or second birth.

The path is inward, not outward, or through belief, external obedience, or simply accepting Jesus as the Savior, or reciting the Bible.

And this path spans lifetimes, encompassing many incarnations and rebirths.

Christ and Krishna: One Truth

The Bhagavad Gita, which predates the Bible by thousands of years, contains a similar phrase spoken by Krishna:

“As men approach Me, so do I accept them. All paths, Arjuna, lead to Me.” (4:11)

This expresses the same universal principle found in esoteric Christianity’s interpretation of “No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

Here, too, the Divine does not speak as a separate historical person but as the eternal Self present in all beings. The “Me” is the inner Divine, the universal Christ or Krishna-consciousness, not the outer form.

Another verse in the Gita says: “Abandon all dharmas and surrender unto Me alone. I shall liberate you from all sin; do not grieve.”

This is a call to surrender the ego and conditioned self and return to union with the indwelling Divine.

In esoteric Christianity, this means awakening the inner Christ, the kingdom within. In the Gita, it means surrendering to Krishna as the Self of all.

But it’s not a personified God you surrender to.

The word “surrender” in the esoteric sense doesn’t mean submission. It means aligning the ego-personality with Divine Will and transmuting the false self into Essence, or the true Self. It is also known as the “sacred Sacrifice” – to give oneself to the Divine.

The Weaponization of Sin and The Sexual Shadow

The dogmatic Christian view of sin frames humans as inherently sinful and in need of external salvation to avoid eternal damnation, which breeds guilt, shame, and fear.

This guilt and shame usually get shoved into the unconscious, then projected onto others through shadow projection, especially onto women, historically, since Eve was blamed for “eating the forbidden fruit” and causing the fall of man.

This repression created a dark collective Christian shadow that has justified the killing of millions “in the name of God”. It enabled the abuse and rape of women and children, including within the Church, which is still happening today in the Vatican.

We still see the shadow in modern culture. The Bible Belt, a region in the southeastern and south-central U.S. where conservative Christians dominate, ranks among the highest in internet pornography consumption.

Data from Pornhub Insights and Google Trends consistently shows that states with high religious conservatism also have very high porn search volumes, especially for “taboo,” “forbidden fetish” content, and gay porn, even more so than liberal areas.

This should come as no surprise if you understand the interrelationship between shadow suppression, projection, and unconscious acting-out from a Jungian perspective.

It’s the same pattern: the person who tries hard to appear decent and moral, parading “traditional values” as virtue signaling while judging others as “sinful” or “immoral”, shaming OnlyFans creators, porn stars, sex workers, hedonism at Burning Man, or any woman they label as “slutty,” and condemning homosexuality as a “sin”, is often harboring a deeply repressed sexual shadow.

That shadow seeks expression in secret, especially when the projections are emotionally charged and rooted in a “holier than thou” sense of superiority.

It comes out late at night on the internet through porn, and at worst, it manifests in the abuse of women and children, even pedophilia in some cases, all while maintaining the outward image of the “good” Christian who goes to church every Sunday and recites the Bible.

Then they feel even more guilt and shame, which they can’t allow themselves to feel and consciously face. Therefore, it becomes repressed and projected outward again onto others as a means to relieve the self-hatred.

In other words, they’re deeply and unconsciously attracted to what they publicly condemn and hate. This is shadow projection 101.

Obviously, this doesn’t apply to all Christians or Conservatives, and not all secretly indulge in porn.

However, the more someone represses the impulses of their lower nature without integrating them through shadow work or transmuting them through esoteric practice, the darker the shadow becomes and the more likely it is to be acted out in secret or projected outward by shaming others for committing “sin.”

In esoteric work, consciously transmuting the sexual center and connecting it to the higher centers is essential. Lust and lower sexual impulses don’t simply disappear through forced repression, confession, or celibacy. They require conscious integration and transformation as part of the inner path.

No wonder many conservative dogmatic Christians call Carl Jung a “false idol.” I’ve even seen some of them claim he was an “occultist” and “satanic.”

Of course, they have to say that, because to take Jung seriously would mean facing the very shadow they’ve spent their lives avoiding, projecting, or acting out in the closet.

Children raised in strict, dogmatic Christian households often suffer deep developmental trauma from fear-based, shame-inducing beliefs.

Spanking and physical punishment of children are justified through a twisted lens of “God-approved morality,” turning abuse into righteousness under the guise of “for your own good.”

Shadow Projections and Hypocrisy on Both Sides

To be clear, liberal leftists are just as prone to virtue signaling and shadow projection.

They channel it through a different ideological lens, often labeling others as “oppressive,” “toxic,” “racist,” or “fascist”, while unconsciously embodying the very traits they denounce, including authoritarianism, racial essentialism, and moral absolutism.

Beyond Guilt: Krishna, Christ, and the True Nature of Sin

In contrast, the Gita’s view of sin is not rooted in guilt, but in spiritual ignorance, acting from ego attachment, desire, and identification with the false self, rather than the inner true Self.

It doesn’t require confession, punishment, or shame, but conscious self-awareness, surrender, and alignment with the Divine through inner work.

There is no eternal hell. There are only karmic consequences that unfold as lessons for growth across lifetimes.

Krishna offers liberation not through guilt or the belief that one is “born in sin” and must be saved by accepting him as “the savior,” but through trust, conscious effort, and remembrance of one’s true nature.

Both Krishna and Christ, in their esoteric expressions, are avatars of Divine Consciousness, the inner God-Self that each soul must realize to unite with its Source. Yoga means “Union.”

Most Hindus do recognize Jesus as a great spiritual teacher, a yogi, a realized soul, and an avatar, but not as the only way to God.

His teachings on love, compassion, and forgiveness align with the core values of bhakti yoga. In other words, what Jesus taught isn’t new.

Fundamentalist and dogmatic Christians, many of whom are former New Agers turned “reborn,” often label Krishna, the ancient Vedas, the Gita, and various Hindu deities (who are simply aspects of the Divine) as “false gods” or “demonic.” This view is ignorant and false.

It comes from a rigid, literalist reading of the Bible and the belief that Jesus is the only way to God, while all other spiritual paths are seen as deception.

Anything that isn’t deemed “Christian” (according to their own subjective and often literal misinterpretation of the Bible) is labeled “demonic” or “satanic.”

The “New Age to Reborn Christian” Pipeline

The term “New Age” is also being hijacked and grossly overgeneralized by a new breed of self-righteous “reborn” Christians. Entirely unrelated teachings and practices are now being lumped into the “New Age” category.

In a past podcast episode, my wife and I discussed the trend of people who were engaged in “New Age practices” and beliefs converting to “re-born” Christians.

We talked about the beliefs this new Christian movement sees as “demonic” and “satanic” [such as yoga & meditation] in their distorted understanding of the “New Age” and “the Occult.”

We discussed the danger of this new dogmatic Neo-Christian revival, how it ties into the concept of “the second Religiosity” as a trauma response, and more.

Listen here: “The New Age To Dogmatic Christian Pipeline.”

The Path of Esoteric Christianity and Integral Yoga

I was raised a Christian. We had a mandatory Bible study class in high school when I was growing up in Germany. I’ve read the Bible multiple times and have been baptized.

But the religious programming never really affected me. I always felt the sense that God was bigger than any religion or book, even as a child.

I never cared for any Church, nor did I ever feel the need to create an identity around it, wear a cross, accept Jesus as my savior, or call myself a “Christian.”

As an adult, I studied esoteric Christianity along with Eastern spiritual teachings. The inner esoteric practice of embodying “Christ consciousness” is about connecting to the heart and bringing forth the true “I” — the true Self or soul-being.

At its core, this path is similar to Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, and Jnana Yoga — all of which I practice as part of the Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo, which brings all these approaches together in the context of the Yoga of Divine Works.

The Sacred Heart of Christ is about embodying love as a higher state of consciousness, acting from that inner alignment, and ultimately spiritualizing life and the body.

Yoga, in this context, has nothing to do with asana poses, which many Christians now label “satanic,” claiming that no Christian should practice yoga.

Nor does chanting yogic mantras “invoke demons.” That’s ignorant nonsense. Yoga is a state of being. As Sri Aurobindo said, “All Life is Yoga.” It’s about making your life, every thought, action, and breath, an offering to the Divine

I recite the Lord’s prayer, and I also listen to the Gayatri mantra. Both are very powerful when spoken with sincerity from the heart.

Beyond Scripture: Direct Experience and the True Rebirth

Reading or quoting scripture can serve as an inspiration and guidance, if interpreted correctly, but it doesn’t automatically result in embodying Christ or awaken the true Self. That requires sincere inner work, humility, and a sincere aspiration toward the Divine, rather than clinging to words and mental ideas of “God.”

That’s why all these theological debates around God and scripture are mostly intellectual games. They say nothing about a person’s level of consciousness (other than perhaps a high intellect, which is not equal to spiritual awareness) or how much soul embodiment is present.

On my path, it has been the integration of spiritual practices from East and West, Integral Yoga, Sufism, Antroposophy, and Esoteric Christianity, combined with somatic work, Western psychology, inner child work, shadow integration, and trauma healing that has opened my heart and connected me to the Divine in ways that words cannot describe.

Once you have the true direct inner experience of Christ/the Divine within, you won’t feel the need to convert others to “your” path.

You won’t even feel the need to identify with a spiritual/religious label, Faith, teaching, or book, nor do you feel the need to tell others to “accept Jesus” or proclaim that “Jesus is the only way.”

You will have found the Kingdom of God, which is within you and visible everywhere as a reflection. As within, so without. Then you will be truly “reborn”, the second birth.

Esoteric Truth Over Historical Debate

This obsession with literalism, arguing over whether Jesus physically walked the Earth, whether the crucifixion and resurrection happened exactly as written, or whether He is the only Son of God, misses the deeper spiritual truth entirely.

When the focus is on history, dogma, and external proof, the inner essence is lost. What matters is not the outer life of a man named Jesus, but the living presence of the Divine/Christ within.

Sri Aurobindo articulates this beautifully in Essays on the Gita, pointing us to the true meaning of Avatarhood and why the literal, historical details pale in comparison to the inner realization of the Divine:

“When we thus understand the conception of Avatarhood, we see that—whether for the fundamental teaching of the Gita or for spiritual life generally—the external aspect has only a secondary importance.

Such controversies as the one that has raged in Europe over the historicity of Christ would seem to a spiritually-minded Indian largely a waste of time.

He would concede to it a considerable historical, but hardly any religious importance.

For what does it matter in the end whether Jesus, son of the carpenter Joseph, was actually born in Nazareth or Bethlehem, lived and taught, and was put to death on a real or a trumped-up charge of sedition?

So long as we can know by spiritual experience the inner Christ, live uplifted in the light of his teaching, and escape from the yoke of the natural Law by that atonement of man with God of which the crucifixion is the symbol?

If the Christ—God made man—lives within our spiritual being, it would seem to matter little whether or not a son of Mary physically lived, suffered, and died in Judaea.

So too, the Krishna who matters to us is the eternal incarnation of the Divine—and not the historical teacher and leader of men.”

— Sri Aurobindo, Essays on the Gita

The moral of the story: you don’t need to accept Jesus as your savior, go to church, or be baptized to enter the kingdom of God, to go to “heaven” or be “saved.”

You also don’t need to follow any scripture or identity with a teaching, faith, or religion. Yes, you can use it as inspiration and some guidance, but don’t attach ot it or take things literally.

And remember, the Bible is one of the most edited and distorted religious texts out there. Making it the foundation and claiming it to be the only and true “word of God,” turning it into a dogma, is what the “devil” wants you to do, ironically.

God loves you as you are and unconditionally. It’s all within you and all around you, once you bring forth that which will liberate you.

Godspeed.

“When the time comes that man no longer wishes to remain a child but wants to grow up and become an adult, then he must understand and neither deceive himself nor others.

Then he will see that God is to be found not in any particular form but in all forms, not in any particular place, but everywhere, not through any single vehicle, faith, cult, religion, building, or man, but in the Infinite.

You will never find God anywhere else but in those conditions; the rest is merely your idea of God, your mental picture. These are purely intellectual things; they are not God or Reality.

So if man wishes to awaken, if he wants to understand himself, he must face the fact that the real avenue to contact with God is not outside himself but within, directly inside. He must find his own way to God through and within himself.

That is, if he seeks God, there is no other way, but if he is looking for ideas, concepts, or mental images, then he can take what orthodox religions and cults offer him.

And because most people have been content to let others do their thinking and their questing for them, they have been satisfied with those conditions.”

– Paul Brunton, The Inner Reality